


You've Gotten Into My Bloodstream

by SordidDetailsFollowing



Series: Bloodstream [2]
Category: Deadpool - All Media Types, Marvel, Spider-Man - All Media Types, spideypool - Fandom
Genre: AU, Angst, Anxiety, Canon-Typical Violence, Dom/sub, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff and Smut, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Nightmares, Peter POV, Self-Harm, Size Difference, Smut, Suicide, The Avengers - Freeform, Torture, Trauma, Underage - Freeform, a tiny little bit of fluff, age gap, alternating pov, dark!Peter, dom!wade, mental health, protective!wade, sub!peter, superhero fun, wade pov
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-06
Updated: 2018-12-12
Packaged: 2019-05-03 02:05:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 61,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14558478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SordidDetailsFollowing/pseuds/SordidDetailsFollowing
Summary: Wade is gone and Peter is broken.Deadpool is killing again and Spider-Man is… Different. They’ve fallen out of sync, and it seems like attempting the impossible to try clawing their way back to how it was before.If they find a way back to each other, will the pieces still fit? Or will the trust between them be too broken to mend?***Sequel toI Think I Might've Inhaled You.





	1. Some Nights I Thirst for Real Blood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dear beloved readers,
> 
> Thanks for sticking around for part two. It’s going to be another wild ride, I can promise you that!
> 
> The chapters are going to be shorter this time around, but hopefully that means updates can happen more frequently. 
> 
> Please enjoy. And, as always:
> 
> I appreciate any and all feedback!
> 
> Please see the end of the chapter for song credits.

**Wade**

**[White]**  
**{Yellow}**

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

_Some nights I thirst for real blood. For real knives. For real cries. And then the flash of steel from real guns, in real life, really fills my mind._

_I really miss what really did exist, when I held your throat so tight._

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

The bottle was heavy where it dangled from Wade’s fingers, held lazily by the neck as he brought it back to his lips. The amber-colored liquid burned the raw skin of his mouth, swiping cold heat over his tongue and prickling his throat when he swallowed it down. 

It was a comforting pain. Familiar. It lulled him into a dull numb ache that smothered the sharper, knife-edged agony still tearing at his insides. The deeper suffering that had sunk its teeth into him. The one he wasn’t thinking about.

“Come on, dude!” The greasy-haired, bespectacled man behind the bar flicked his dirty dishrag at Wade’s arm. “That’s my last fuckin’ Blue Label and I’m not getting another shipment of Johnny ‘till Wednesday.”

Wade didn’t even bother to shrug. He just took another swig of the top-shelf whiskey, letting a bit of it dribble down the scarred skin of his chin just to spite Weasel. He reached up with his other gloved hand to scratch at the edge of his mask, which was only rolled up to his nose even though there was no one else in Sister Margaret’s at the moment. It was still too early for the after-dinner crowd. He found himself wishing, once again, that the bottle and a half of hard liquor he’d downed in the last hour could knock him the fuck out. Or at least get him shit-faced enough that he couldn’t remember his name.

{I’d give anything. Kill anyone. Bend the fuck over and take it from the fucking Hulk if only we could get drunk. Black out drunk. Right now.}

[There are other ways. Just hang on until tonight.] White soothed them both, a calm patch of reason amidst the hurricane that had blown through Wade’s head. [We’ll be fine until then.]

Wade grunted his affirmation, though he didn’t let himself dwell long on the thought. “You know I’m good for it.” He mumbled to Weasel, a bit belatedly. 

The bartender scoffed. “Yeah, fuck face. I know.” He started stacking glasses near the tap in preparation for the evening’s influx of patrons. “Shit. Never seen anyone take so many jobs in one weekend. Even you gotta take breaks, right? Give that trigger finger a little rest.”

[No. No breaks. Get back to your routine. The blood helps.]

{Helps…}

[Helps you remember who you are.]

“I wouldn’t be taking _this_ break if you would just give me another fucking mark.” Wade growled, flicking a peanut shell off the bar and hitting Weasel on the forehead.

“Ow! What the fuck, man.” He rubbed obligatorily between his eyes, shooting Wade a mildly irritated look. “I told you, I’m all out. You did nine fucking jobs in less than two days, Wilson. It usually takes a week to do that many when I’m dealing to the whole group.” He grimaced. “Jareth’s gonna be pissed tonight, by the way. And I’m gonna tell him it was _you_ who took his card.”

Wade waved his bottle carelessly through the air, brushing Weasel off. “Like I couldn’t take a fucker who names himself after the mother-trucking Goblin King. Even if I _could_ bleed out, I wouldn’t worry about that asshole’s cute little stilettos.”

[Bea and Arthur have much better extension than those idiotic blades. What kind of mercenary chooses a pocket knife as his weapon of choice, anyway?]

Wade nodded. “B and A would love to show off.” He muttered under his breath. His babies had had their thirst thoroughly quenched these past thirty-nine hours, but they could always spill a little more blood. Even better if it belonged to a merc.

“You’re in a mood.” Weasel remarked, voice taking on a more serious tone that had Wade tipping the Johnny Walker back to his lips to chug down the rest. He was pleased to see the bartender flinch at his blasphemous actions.

“What’s your damage? Cat run away cause even animals can’t stand your meat-grinder mug?” He gave up wiping uselessly at the counter top and crossed his arms to lean against the grimy surface instead. “Trouble in paradise? What’s the deal with your little – ”

The muzzle of Wade’s gun pressed tight to Weasel’s jaw, moving ever so slightly as the man jerked and swallowed, muscles shifting beneath his skin. Wade had drawn Dick (his Desert Eagle) before the next word could leave Weasel’s lips. He’d taken to wearing the larger pistol on his left hip, pushing Betty down to his right thigh holster. Second place was a bitch but Wade had been in a Dick mood lately. 

“What now, Wade?” He kept his voice steady, but there was a flicker of nervousness in his watery eyes as he held completely still. “Did he – ”

Wade cocked the gun, the soft click echoing in the empty room.

Weasel’s breath hitched.

“Alright… Alright, fuck. New fuckin’ topic.” 

Yellow whimpered pathetically in the back of Wade’s mind.

He slowly lowered the pistol, holding Weasel’s gaze for another lingering second before tucking Dick back into his warm leather holster.

“So what, you tellin’ me business is slow?” Wade picked up like nothing had happened, reaching across the counter for an unopened jar of maraschino cherries. “You don’t have a waiting list of the rich and powerful desperate to off their little problems?”

Weasel sniffed, a subtle show of his disgruntlement, and went back to wiping his perpetually filthy bar. “Naw. Business is the opposite of slow, but lots of the guys are out on jobs right now. And it’s usually more of a steady flow type thing; I don’t keep a list. I’m not an absolute idiot.”

[But he certainly plays one convincingly.]

“Coulda fooled me.” Wade remarked, tipping the glass jar to his lips and shaking several sugary-sweet cherries into his mouth. Weasel made a face and Wade chewed with his mouth open, purposefully letting the man catch glimpses of the mashed up red mess spread over his tongue.

“Do you have to do that? I already know you’re disgusting, you’ve got nothin’ to prove here.”

“It’s part of my aesthetic.” Wade declared, spraying little bits of artificial red over the surface of the bar.

Weasel made a retching sound low in his throat and reached out to wipe the mess up with his rag. “I’d hate to see your tumblr account, man.”

“Naw, my little rodent-faced friend. You’d love it. It’s all furry porn and dick pics. And unicorns. And unicorn dick pics.”

{And Spi– }

[Those all fit into the same category, Wade.]

“I never cease to be disturbed by you.” Weasel balled the soiled fabric up and tossed it into the trash, then looked around blankly as if unsure what to do with himself now that his beloved filthy old rag was gone.

Wade decided to help him out. “You got any new product for me to try out?” As well as managing a bar and the most prestigious mercenary ring this side of the ocean, Weasel was also a proficient arms dealer. He let Wade try out all his new equipment because, well, it was handy to have a test dummy who couldn’t die. 

“Come back Tuesday.” He leaned against the counter, crossing his arms over his chest. “I’m gettin’ two dozen M40 snipers with new sights, supposed to have improved thermal imaging, and a crate of C4 from a new seller, need you to test the blast range.”

{We get to blow stuff up?} Yellow asked, pitifully hopeful.

“Oh goodie! Sounds fun. Like an absolute _blast_.”

Weasel was not amused. Admittedly, it hadn’t been one of Wade’s best puns. “Oh, and Frank is bringing a compound crossbow over. I’m not sure if I’ll have buyers, but I wanted to get the specs from you.”

“Easy peasy lemon squeezy.” The merc dumped another mouthful of cherries across his tongue so that his next words were muffled and wet. “Tell ‘im I want my RPG back. Fucker’s had it since November.”

“Will do, bro from another ho.” Weasel pulled a notepad and pen out from some drawer and jotted something down, hopefully a reminder to ask Frank for his motherfucking rocket launcher back. “I could get you a new one, though. Only ten, maybe twenty grand. It’s really a great – ”

He was cut off by the low-fi opening beat of Straight Outta Compton. Wade watched in disbelief as he put down the pen and fished his cellphone out of his pocket. 

“Dude. You have _not_ earned that ringtone.”

Weasel ignored him, turning away to answer with a casual, “Talk to me.”

{Ruthless, never seen, like a shadow in the dark.}

“Except when I unload.” Wade rapped under his breath, head bobbing to the beat. “You see a spark and jump over hesitation.”

[And hear the scream of the one who got the lead penetration.]

It was a good track. Wade made a mental note to update his hot pink iPod classic when he got the chance. The screen was badly cracked and uploading songs took fucking forever, but he kept using it because he’d stuck a limited-edition Hello Kitty sticker on the back in 2008 and replacing that shit would be hella difficult. 

“Yeah. Okay, yup. We can do that. Uh, actually it might get done tonight… Yeah, I’ll text this number with confirmation.” Weasel wrapped up his conversation, which Wade had only bothered to catch half of.

“You got somethin’ for me?” He asked, posture never shifting from its relaxed slump on the bar stool although his focus was razor sharp, causing Weasel to lick his lips like the nervous little rat he was.

“Yes, actually.” Weasel slid a small white card across the bar. A name and address were scrawled on the back in the bartender’s messy handwriting.

[Fucking finally.]

“An address? That’s no fun, baby. At least make me work for it.” He took the card anyway, slipping it into his belt.

Weasel sighed. “I didn’t vet it. You wanna wait?”

“Hell no.” Wade was already sliding off the stool, pulling the edge of his mask down so he was fully covered once again.

“So you’re gonna check it out first? Make sure everything’s above board?” As much as it could be for a paid assassination, anyhow.

“Yeah, sure.” Probably not.

{Oh, let’s go.} Yellow’s tone was strained, needy and plaintive. {Can we go now, please?}

“Wade, look.” Wade leaned over the bar, as if getting closer would keep Wade from leaving. “I don’t know what’s happened, but – ”

Wade growled out a low, vicious warning, shooting Weasel a dangerous glare that would cause most who knew him to lose control of their bladders. 

Weasel did have _some_ self-preservation instincts, so he refrained from finishing that sentence. “Just… Don’t do anything to screw this network. I know your lazy ass wouldn’t want to have to find all your jobs on your own.”

Wade grunted in affirmation and turned to stride quickly out the front doors. He didn’t plan on lingering a second longer than he had to. Not when some poor fuck was out there waiting for him. 

[Waiting for the sweet kiss of our blades.]

{Waiting to scream, bleed, cry, _beg_ …}

Not when Wade had a job to do.

[Just like old times, baby.]

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

The address was a cramped little brownstone duplex in the Bronx. Wade didn’t have much cover to hide himself on the residential street at eight in the evening, the sun still casting an orange glow over the city as it set, but he didn’t really give a shit. Crouching down behind a modest silver Honda Civic parked near the corner, he watched through the windows of number forty-eight to see which apartments were currently occupied. 

He glanced over a group of teenagers playing videogames on an oversized flat screen, stared for a minute at a couple making out in their kitchen (both were definitely over sixty years old, but the hotness factor was still a solid seven out of ten), and skipped by a sad woman cooking dinner and a family watching TV. Two of the apartments appeared to be empty of people and the other four had the curtains completely drawn. Number 3B, his target, was one of those.

“Looks like we’ll be going for the surprise behind door number three, Bob.”

{Let’s go. Go now, Wade, now! Right fucking now come on what the fuck are you even waiting for get your ass over there so we can get on with it already Wade come _on_!}

[Stop being so impatient. We’re already here.]

{But we haven’t unalived anyone in _hours_!}

“Yeah, like seven.” Wade muttered as he stood up and strolled casually towards the brownstone, slipping a lock-pick out of his belt as he climbed the three crumbling steps to the front door.

[We’re not a junkie whore, Yellow. We can control ourselves when it’s necessary.]

{I don’t know about that.}

[…No, I guess you’re right.]

Wade jiggled the pick just so and felt the metal click beneath his fingers as the locking mechanism released. He pulled the door open, pretending he’d let himself in like a normal person with a key, and slipped inside to a narrow hallway with one steep staircase straight ahead. 

“Better get to it.” Wade muttered as he took the stairs three at a time, making his way quickly but silently up to the third floor. “If someone sees a grown man dressed up like some weird red leather daddy with giant swords and calls the fuzz, our evening of entertainment might be cut short.” 

[At this time of night and in this location, it should be about twenty-eight minutes from the time someone puts in a call before dispatch gets to the building.]

{How the fuck do you know that?}

[I seem to be the only one who actually uses Wade’s brain.]

“Fair enough.” Wade conceded under his breath, pausing in front of 3B. He leaned in close, pressing his mask-covered ear to the thin wood of the door and listening for movement inside. All he could hear were the tinny echoes of overdramatic actors talking through some TV speakers, but that was enough of an indication that someone was probably home.

{Thank fuck. Bust the door in, Wade!}

[Right, because that’s the best way to enter a room when you have no idea what lies inside.]

Wade rolled his eyes at their bickering, but sank into the familiarity of it as he got to work with his lock pick one more time. Kicking in doors _was_ a lot of fun, but he wanted as much time as he could get with his mark, so it seemed like a smart move to at least try to be subtle about this.

The lock clicked open beneath his hand, and he tucked the small metal tool away before slowly, carefully turning the door knob. He lay his free hand on Dick before silently swinging the door half-way open, just enough to slip inside quickly and glance around the apartment as he closed it again.

His mark was here, seated on the couch. He faced away from the door, watching television and showing no indication whatsoever that he was aware of Wade’s presence.

[Perfect.]

Wade stepped further in, taking the chance to check out the layout of the place before he called attention to himself. A hallway to his right seemed to lead to the bedroom and bathroom. Nothing on the left but a coat rack, and ahead was the living room, a small dining table, and what was clearly the kitchen off to the side. Three exit points (two large windows and the front door) with the possibility of a fourth in the bathroom, since it lay along the outer wall. Most likely knives in the kitchen and at least two dozen places to hide a weapon just in Wade’s sightline. 

He moved without a sound, coming right up behind the couch now, and got a good look at the bald spot on the back of his mark’s head, surrounded by thin ginger hair. He was spread out on the cushions, a bud light in one hand and the other shoved down the front of his pants. Wade glanced up at the TV. 

“Baywatch? You have _got_ to be kidding me.” Wade exclaimed.

The man whipped around, jerking backwards off the couch in the process, tripped over himself, and spilled his beer all over the front of his pants.

{He finished already? Those beach bunnies are hardly prime wanking material.}

Wade leapt over the back of the couch before anyone could start shouting, putting himself between his mark and the TV, making the poor guy jerk around all over again, his eyes wild with shock and chest heaving.

“Who the hell – ”

Wade kicked him in the stomach, and he collapsed back onto the couch, gasping and gagging and clutching at his ribs like Wade had used a knife instead of his (admittedly very sturdy) boot.

[What a pussy.]

“Deadpool, at your service!” He reached up to tilt an invisible hat and gave the man a jaunty little bow. “And who might you be?”

He coughed, glaring up at Wade like he wasn’t sure whether to be terrified or furious. It was a look Wade was quite accustomed to. “What the fuck? Who the fuck – ”

Wade slapped him, snapping that ugly face to the side, before leaning in and grabbing his chin roughly between his leather-covered thumb and forefinger. He forced the man’s gaze back to him.

“Are you Jeremy Summers?”

The man writhed, trying to yank himself out of Wade’s grip, but he went still real quick when Wade shoved his gun in his face.

“Let me repeat that for you.” His voice went low, a growl of unadulterated intimidation. “Are. You. Jeremy. Summers.”

The man swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing noticeably. “W-Who wants to know?”

Wade rolled his eyes, adding a slight head toss to make the gesture clear through the mask. “We went over that already, darling. Do try to keep up. I’m Deadpool, and you’re…” He released the guy’s chin, holding him still with Dick’s muzzle pressed up to his temple as he reached into the man’s pocket and dug around for a wallet.

{Yuck. We don’t wanna get in this one’s pants.}

“No shit.” He felt the folded leather and tugged it out, flipping it open one-handed to read the driver’s license under the smudged plastic window. “Aha! Nice to meet you, Jeremy.” He tossed the wallet aside. “We’re gonna have some fun tonight. You like fun?”

[Sure he does.]

“Sure you do. Everybody likes fun. Right, Yellow?”

{Right. So let’s get on with it and _have some_!}

“Always the impatient one. You like to take your time, don’t you Jeremy? Really savor the moment. Make it last. Edging for the win, am I right?”

Jeremy was starting to look really frightened now.

[Good.]

“Good. Me too.” Wade backed up a pace, removing Dick’s tip from Jeremy’s face and gesturing with the gun for him to get up.

{I think the authors are having a little too much fun with this whole Dick thing.}

[Do you care?]

{Not tonight!}

“Sit over there.” Wade directed, prodding his mark’s arm to get him to move into the dining room and take a seat in one of the flimsy chairs.

“What the hell do you want?” He asked as he sat, voice gruff though his eyes betrayed his terror.

Wade laughed. It was a hollow, brittle sound. “What do I want?”

{We want…}

[Blood.]

{Yes.}

[Screams.]

{Screams.}

[Shattered bones.]

{Black and blue.}

[Begging.]

{Crying.}

[Breaking.]

{Bleeding. _Bleeding_.}

“Yes.” Wade closed his eyes for just a moment, a breath, the buzz beneath his skin crawling over his ribs, up his throat, squeezing the air from his lungs. “Yes.” He drew a zip-tie from his belt and wrenched Jeremy’s hands behind the chair, securing them together with a quick yank, not bothering to be careful about cutting off blood flow. He wasn’t going to be here long enough to worry about that, unfortunately. Then he did the legs, easily capturing each flailing foot and tying it to the legs of the chair. “Hold still, now. You don’t want to be a bad boy for Daddy.”

“Wha – What do you want? You want money?”

“Not in the slightest!” He stood, crossing to the kitchen to start opening drawers and rifling around.

[Don’t bother.]

{Yeah, let’s just _cut him_ already!}

He ignored them, shifting aside scissors and take-out menus, batteries and broken knick-knacks, silverware. Finding nothing incriminating, he moved to the cabinet beneath the sink. He tossed out cleaning supplies, rags, a rat trap. Growing frustrated, desperate, he stalked into the living room. He checked the couch cushions, because this idiot seemed like he might be _that_ stupid. Nope.

[Give it up. We don’t need a reason; the name is enough.]

Grunting, Wade moved to the TV, where lifeguards with big jugs were running in slow motion across a beach, and slid his hand around the back of it.

“Bingo.” He grinned beneath the mask, wrenching the 9 mm Glock from where it was taped down and brandishing it at Jeremy. “You got a permit for this baby?” The weight suggested it was half-loaded.

Jeremy gaped at him. “What? I… I don’t…”

“Wonderful.”

Wade shot him in the thigh.

There was a moment of shocked silence, the blast of the gunshot echoing in their ears. Then Jeremy started yelling.

“AH FUCK! WHAT THE FUCK? OH MY GOD OH FUCK, YOU FUCKING SHOT ME!”

Wade snickered, tossing the Glock onto the dining room table as he strode back in. “Ah, calm your fat titties, I didn’t even hit the artery.”

[If the cops weren’t already on their way, they will be now.]

{Doesn’t matter. We’ll have time.}

“Plenty.” Wade drew a balisong from his thigh, flipping it open with easy leisure. 

Jeremy started struggling, ankles and wrists straining white against the plastic of the bindings. “What the fuck? What the fuck! Why the fuck are you doing this oh my god, OH MY GOD HELP! HELP SOMEBODEY HELP!”

[That won’t do.]

{The screaming does get a bit annoying after a while, doesn’t it?} 

Wade sighed, taking a quick detour to the kitchen for some duct tape he’d seen in the drawer. He returned to slap a piece of it over his captive’s mouth, quieting the frantic yells into muffled, half-formed words that were no longer intelligible.

“There, now. Much better!” Wade patted Jeremy on the cheek, causing him to flinch terribly. “Let’s get started then, shall we?”

{Oh yes. Oh yes, we shall.}

Wade sank to his knees before his captive and stared into two watery green eyes, sclera bloodshot and pupils two pinpricks of black. His panic was practically palpable. Wade breathed it in.

“Say goodbye.” He raised his blade, tracing a slow, delicate line down the side of Jeremy’s face. Red bloomed in its wake, and a muted whimper broke past the makeshift gag.

{To your incest eyes.}

Wade moved down to a collar bone, etching a row of shallow red lines above the neck of his t-shirt.

[Blue blood.]

The knife found ribs, tracing their shape through cheap fabric that soon grew wet, stained a darker shade.

“Say why shattered glass.”

He was screaming behind the tape now, but Wade could hardly hear him, focused as he was on his work.

{Makes shattered ribs.}

Bare arms made a blank canvas, and Wade painted it red. His lines were beautiful, intentional, etching his mark into the ruined skin.

[The sounds of screaming.]

{Save us please.}

[Open wounds.]

“Drowned in kerosene.”

Skin looked so thin when it began to peel. When he placed the lines close enough, he could see the untouched space in between turn nearly translucent, a nick in the right direction had blood bubbling up from underneath, leaking out so _beautifully_.

He moved on to the thighs, avoiding the large wet stain already covering one leg and focusing on filling in the other surfaces. When his heart beat slow in his ears and the taste on his tongue was sweet with anticipation, he moved back to Jeremy’s face.

He sucked in ragged gasps of air, nostrils flaring, eyes dull with pain, and trembled beneath Wade’s gaze. His skin was shiny with sweat and tears and snot, pale and feverish all at once. A ravishing fucking mess.

Wade leaned in close, breath ghosting warm across the duct tape. “So, what do you think of me?”

{Is it a joke?}

[Or a part of me?]

Jeremy Summers shuddered, a pathetic, terrified whine leaking past the gag.

{Make threats to switchblade lovers.}

Wade disappeared the balisong and drew one of his katanas, the slide of metal on leather setting his nerves alight. 

Jeremy struggled again, eyes going wide although his movements were weak and sluggish as he tossed his head in protest. Wade rose, grabbing him by the neck and planting one knee on the chair between his thighs.

“Okay, baby.”

He settled the tip of his blade beneath one heaving rib, angling it so it would slide cleanly past the spinal column, and took a deep breath.

Slowly, ever so slowly, he began to push in.

Jeremy jerked, voice cutting off with a mangled half-scream. 

It really was like an addiction. The rush of power. The incredible feeling of someone’s entire life leaking away beneath your hands. Being responsible for something so _final_. So intimate. The sweet release. That easy, familiar ache of self-loathing.

Like a drug.

It took forty-nine seconds for Jeremy to die. He twitched weakly as the blade sank deeper, heaving breaths turning wet and labored as Wade pierced a lung. It wasn’t long after that, light slowly fading from his frantic eyes as Wade held him by the throat.

He went still for a while when silence fell, letting the relief sink into his bones, his mind a quiet sated stillness for just this moment. 

Distantly, the quiet whine of sirens broke through the haze of calm.

[Alright. Let’s go now.]

Wade grunted softly, sliding his katana out with a low, slick, wet sound and sheathing her again, resigned to cleaning the blood off later.

He left Jeremy Summers for dead and climbed out the window, taking the three-story drop and smoothly scaling a chain link fence to go around the back of the property. He slipped out unseen on the next street over as the cops pulled up in front, lights flashing and sirens blaring.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

The hazel eyes staring up at him were unimpressed and unintimidated, the sure sign of an experienced professional. Wade was grateful that this was the one he’d ended up with. Most would blanch at the sight of his suit and weapons, fumble for their phones and tremble with the urge to run away when they saw the bare apartment he took them to. Some asked him to take off the mask. Those never lasted long.

But this one wasn’t scared. She wasn’t anything, really, so maybe a healthy dose of fear might do her some good. But that wasn’t what Wade wanted. Not from this one.

“Turn around.” He demanded quietly, but firmly.

The woman stretched out on his bed, clad only in a sheer black thong, obediently rolled over onto her stomach and propped herself up on her knees and elbows, presenting her well-proportioned ass and shapely legs. 

She was the kind of hooker Wade would have positively drooled over five years ago. Before paying people to sleep with him became too pitiful and sickening even for his twisted sense of right and wrong. Not that being a prostitute was wrong! It wasn’t. Hell, Wade had fallen in love with a lady of the night once upon a time, before the cancer and all that other shit. It hadn’t gone anywhere, but for a while Wade had thought it might last. Her name had started with a V, but he could hardly even remember her face now. 

No. It was wrong to make _them_ sleep with a man who could literally star in most people’s nightmares. He knew how disgusting he was; nobody should have to put up with that, even for an obscenely generous amount of money. 

But this one seemed unfazed by him, and if he kept the mask and suit on then maybe he could avoid traumatizing her. He cleared his throat absent-mindedly, hands twitching at his sides as he tried to remember what to do next. The hooker (Miss Crystal Chandelier according to the website) seemed to take that as a sign to reach back and peel her underwear off, leaving her fully exposed to Wade’s blank gaze.

[Damn. She’s ready to go.]

Yes, Wade noted that White was right. It appeared that she had prepared both her entrances; a prudent thing to do in her line of work. No waiting around for preparation or relying on her body to react to strangers she probably didn’t find the least bit attractive. And no risk of an over-eager John hurting her because he couldn’t fucking wait to shove his dick into something.

Wade felt mildly ill.

[Quit stalling and get to it. She’s a beautiful fucking catch, Wade! Look at that ass… Very nice, am I right?]

Wade reached down to unbuckle his belt and unzip his pants, lowering them just enough to pull his cock out of the opening. It was soft in his leather-clad hand, apparently unaware of the current situation. Wade stared down at it in confusion.

{Wow. This is a first.}

[Jesus.] White hissed. [This is exactly why we need to do this. Fucking look at the hot girl on your bed, waiting for you to fuck her, and get it up like a fucking man.]

Crystal Chandelier glanced over her shoulder, long hair tumbling messily across her smooth back as she checked to see what was taking so long. The first sign of any emotion since she’d knocked on Wade’s door flickered across her face when she realized his predicament; amusement. But she didn’t laugh. She hummed softly and sat back up, shifting around to face Wade, who was considering shoving his uncooperative dick back where it came from and calling the whole thing off.

“Need a little help?” She asked kindly, a soft quirk to the edges of her cherry-red lips. Before Wade could respond, she leaned forward and caught the tip of his cock in her mouth, swiping her tongue over the slit.

Wade hissed softly, letting his hand drop away as if he’d been shocked. The hooker didn’t hesitate to take over, reaching up to wrap her fingers around his base as she slowly sank her mouth further down his soft length. It was warm. And wet. And she kept her teeth skillfully sheathed beneath her lips.

Wade felt himself growing hard from her ministrations, but he fixed his gaze on the wall across the room, unwilling to watch as she swirled her tongue deftly around his shaft and began to suck in earnest. He was still a red-blooded Canadian male, fucked up as he was, and his body reacted without any conscious involvement on his part. He was fully erect in less than half a minute.

“Mm.” Candy pulled off with a slick, muffled sound and Wade glanced down to see her stare at the head of his cock as she stroked him once, grip tight.

“You’re so big…” She purred before swallowing him down again.

Wade grunted, a harsh twist of _wrong_ cutting into his gut. 

He reached up with one hand to grab a fistful of her clearly bleached blond hair, the dark roots more obvious as his tight grip pulled at them. She started to moan, a loud, fake sound, but Wade yanked her off before he could feel the vibrations shoot through his groin.

“Turn around.” He muttered again, heart beginning to pound in his chest.

She did so without complaint, assuming the same position as before. Wade swallowed hard, reaching for the little foil square sitting on the bed beside her. He didn’t have anything and he couldn’t catch anything, but it was common curtesy in these sorts of situations so he ripped open the packet and shakily smoothed the condom down the length of his cock. He paused then, fingers wrapped around his base, and struggled to decide which hole he should put it in. He’d usually ask a girl before shoving anything up her ass, but this one was clearly prepared for it either way he went.

[Why are you acting like this is your first fucking time with a prostitute? Suck it up and stick it in, idiot.]

{Her skin is too tan.}

Wade gritted his teeth and lay one hand on her hip, guiding himself between the soft, full cheeks of her ass. 

{Her hips are too wide.}

He pushed lightly at her entrance, the sensation on the head of his cock dulled slightly by the sheath of thin rubber between them. 

{Her hair is the wrong color.}

The woman moaned, a breathy sound that prickled unpleasantly at the back of Wade’s neck, and pushed back encouragingly.

{Her voice is wrong.}

Wade was breathing faster, his stomach dropping as he felt himself breaching the slickened ring of muscle.

{Everything about her is wrong.}

She was wrong. This was wrong. It felt wrong. 

{She’s not – }

Him.

Wade sucked in a ragged gasp and pulled back abruptly, breaking all contact with the woman. He turned his back to her, fingers a little clumsy as he peeled the condom off, letting it fall where it would, and tucked himself away. He had himself zipped and buckled back up in just a couple of seconds, but he didn’t turn back to look at her. He couldn’t.

“I already paid and left a generous tip, so don’t worry about that.” He crossed to the bedroom door. “You can stay as long as you like, I won’t be back.”

He slung his katanas on by the door and left the apartment before she could say a word, his stomach churning with a confusing mix of guilt and anger and self-disgust.

[Well. That certainly went well.]

“I don’t need to hear it.” Wade muttered, fingers itching for the pistol on his left hip. He made it to the street and ducked into the closest ally, turning in the direction of the temporary safe house they’d set up in a warehouse in Brooklyn. 

[I know.] Wade wasn’t quite used to the new, kinder tone White had been taking lately, but he was grateful for it nevertheless. [It’s fine. We’ll get there.]

Wade tried not to think about that. Because the prospect of forgetting, getting back to the way things used to be…

He walked a little faster, eager to get back and end this day. 

[Almost there.]

He kept his mind as blank as possible, latching onto a tune to hum under his breath, not letting his thoughts drift too far in a dangerous direction. Yellow picked it up after a few moments, a little lethargic on the uptake.

{Don’t speak. I know what you’re thinking.}

[I don’t need your reasons.]

{Don’t tell me ‘cause it hurts.}

“It’s all ending.” Wade sang softly, throat tight around the words.

[I gotta stop pretending who we are.]

{You and me, I can see us dying. Are we?}

He pulled a small silver key from a pouch on his belt and fit it into the padlock on the gate, relieved to slip past the chain-link fence into the small warehouse complex he’d been using for shipping purposes since he arrived in New York. He made a beeline for the building where he’d set up camp, absently taking note that the trip wires he’d laid out earlier were still intact. 

[Home sweet home.] The edge of sarcasm to White’s words was gentler than usual.

“You betcha.” Wade muttered, shutting the sliding door behind him and bolting the heavy lock. He shrugged off Bea and Arthur, leaving them by a crate full of fragmentation grenades, and flung himself down on the mattress lying on the cement floor. It was stained and uncovered, but Wade wasn’t exactly concerned with hygiene right now.

[Another day done. Let’s take a rest, try again tomorrow.]

{Sleep.}

“Finally.” Wade breathed a reverent sigh of relief, slipping Dick from his holster and flipping the safety off. He slipped his mask off with the other hand and set it aside. He hated to remove it, but he was running low and hadn’t remembered to order more until this morning. 

Eager, unwilling to wait a moment longer, Wade lay back and slid the cold, smooth muzzle of the Desert Eagle between his lips. The slight coppery tang of metal, the bitter taste of gun powder and oil against his tongue, soothed his nerves and slowed his heartbeat. The click of the hammer cocking was like flipping a switch, endorphins releasing and muscles melting into the broken springs of the mattress. He allowed himself a moment, relishing the sweet rush of relief flooding his veins, before tightening his finger on the trigger.

The days were long and the nights were longer, but at least he could spend them mostly unconscious. 

Thank gods for small blessings.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

The phone rang in the night.

It happened when Wade was conscious, an unfortunate necessity as he dug more bullets out of the case beside the mattress, and they all recognized the ringtone in an instant.

Yellow wanted to look. Wanted to hear the voicemail that beeped its presence from Wade’s pocket. But White knew.

White knew that it hurt too much to be alive right now.

He wasn’t awake to hear the second call.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Monday was difficult.

Wade hadn’t thought it could get any harder than it had been, each moment of breathing and living and thinking and feeling more painful than the last, but he was wrong. 

No more jobs came down the pipeline from Sister Margaret’s, and Wade was too… Something. Too scared, or _something_ to listen to his voicemails for a client of his own.

He spent the day, well, wandering, he guessed. He wasn’t sure. And that’s what really frightened him. Finding himself crouched behind the hydrangea bushes in the backyard of a worn, but well-kept house that he didn’t recognize, holding his gun at his side with no clue of how he got there, Wade tasted the bitter sharp poison of panic at the back of his throat.

Yellow thought they might be on a job, but Wade didn’t have a card on him and White assured them that they hadn’t checked their messages. 

He counted his bullets and checked his hands and blades for blood on the way back into the city.

He just had to make it to the end of the day. Just make it until dark without going off again, and he could spend another night asleep.

He didn’t make it.

At half past six, against White’s desperate urgings, Wade found himself in Queens.

He climbed a familiar fire-escape to a familiar roof, and settled down into a familiar spot tucked beside what used to be a small garden. He stared across the street at a familiar building, eyes skimming down to find one very familiar window.

The blinds were up. They usually were. It made sense now; he wouldn’t want to have to make any noise raising them when he slipped through the window at night.

[He won’t be home. It’s too early – he’ll still be at his boyfriend’s.]

White didn’t twist the knife, but the word still cut sharp beneath his ribs. 

He didn’t want him to be home. To see him… But _fuck_ that was exactly what he wanted. He wanted it so bad he could puke.

He looked into the dim room, straining his eyes to catch the details of the posters on his wall, the books piled on his desk, the clothes lying crumpled on his hardwood floor. His gaze drifted over everything, taking it all in, and when he reached the bed, his breath caught in his throat.

He was there.

Wade hadn’t noticed at first, the shape beneath the navy sheets. Just the barest hint of thick, dark hair was visible against his pillow, above the drawn-up edge of the comforter.

He wasn’t moving. 

Was he asleep?

As Wade watched, holding his breath as if a single movement could blow this mirage away like so much dust on the wind, he shifted.

He writhed, kicking the blankets down just slightly as he turned to bury his head in the pillow. The movement revealed his face. Just a bit, just for a moment, but it was enough to see.

To see the shape of his nose. The curve of his lips.

The shadow of his eyelashes.

{ _Peter_.} 

Yellow whimpered brokenly, and Wade’s entire body strained forward. He felt breathless and sick and so full of need he was a heartbeat away from jumping off the roof.

[We need to go Wade.]

{No… No, he’s _here_. Peter’s _here_ and we _need_ him.}

[No. We need to _leave_. Now.]

But he couldn’t. He was glued to the spot, riveted, watching. Because he was still moving. His shoulders shook in hitching, uneven shudders, upsetting the sheets. Thin, pale fingers clutched at the pillow that hid his face. 

{He hurts. Wade, he hurts.}

Wade’s whole heart _ached_ , like it was trying to crawl up his throat and choke him.

{When he called us last night…}

[Alright, this isn’t working.]

{Do you think maybe… Something happened?}

[We can’t be here. We’ll never be able to forget if we’re so close to him.]

What if something happened? Because this… This didn’t just look like guilt. Wade wasn’t worth this.

[If you keep coming back here, you’ll get fucked over for good. We’ll be broken all over again and I’m sure as hell not gonna pick up the pieces this time. So we need to leave.]

{Leave…?}

[We need to.]

{Where?}

[Doesn’t matter.]

“But…”

Suddenly, Peter went very still. A moment later, the bedroom door opened. Aunt May looked tired and sad and more than a little worried. She carried a plate with what looked like a bowl of soup and a few crackers on it. She set it on the desk beside his bed, where a full glass of water already sat on a coaster.

She said something, but Wade didn’t catch the shape of the words on her lips. He was watching Peter, who hadn’t moved an inch since she came in.

She sat on the edge of his bed and reached out, laying a hand on his back. He curled in on himself at the touch, gently flinching away.

{Something happened.}

[It doesn’t matter.]

Wade was already standing up. “He needs us.”

[He doesn’t.]

{But he _hurts_.}

It didn’t matter. It didn’t matter that Wade’s heart was broken and each breath hurt when he looked at him. Peter. It didn’t matter because something happened and Wade had to know. He had to fix it.

[No.]

Wade turned to stride back to the fire-escape.

[ _No_.]

Wade started the long climb down.

[I’m not letting him hurt us again.]

“You don’t get a say in this.”

[I’m not. Letting him hurt us. Again.]

Wade’s boots touched pavement and he turned towards Peter’s building.

He tried to step forward, but his legs jerked beneath him, muscles locking up.

He reached for his gun, fingers twitching against the grip, but he was too late.

Wade felt himself slipping. Slipping inside. Slipping away.

[I’m going to keep us safe, Wade.] His tone was gentle, and Wade was angry but he couldn’t hate him. Not even for this.

At least this way they wouldn’t be hurt more.

White turned them around, and took them out of Queens.

White bought the ticket – one way. 

White packed their bag. 

White got them to the airport for a six a.m. flight to Libya.

Wade watched the city lights shrink beneath them as they rose into the air and headed out over the Atlantic. The sky scrapers looked like toys. New York looked so small from this far away; so lonely.

He watched it disappear as they left.

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Song Credits:

Chapter Title:  
For Real – Okkervil River  
Lyrics:  
Straight Outta Compton – N.W.A.  
Love and Caring – Crystal Castles  
Don’t Speak – No Doubt

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************


	2. Nothing Left to Hold On To

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi sweet readers.
> 
> Thank you for all the wonderful comments! Each and every one warms my cold dark heart and fuels the continuation of this work.
> 
> You're all fabulous.
> 
> I appreciate any and all feedback!
> 
> Please see the end of the chapter for song credits.

**Peter**

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

_Stuck between the do or die, I feel emaciated. Hard to breathe, I try and try, I’ll get asphyxiated._  
_Swinging from the tallest height, with nothing left to hold on to. Every sky is blue, but not for me and you._

_Come home._

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

There’s a moment.

Just a moment, when Peter first wakes up. Before he remembers that Harry is dead and Wade is gone. There’s a moment when his sheets feel warm and sunlight makes the backs of his eyelids glow orange and everything else feels like the dream.

And then it all comes crashing down around him, and he remembers that _this_ is the dream. 

Peter lives for those moments. But they’re rare, few and far between. More often, he wakes in a blind panic. His heart pounds and his vision blurs, his chest feels so tight that he’s sure he’ll die here, silently suffocating in his own bed. He gasps and sweats and shakes, the lingering remnants of his dreams still clinging to his skin, fractured bits of darkness. Flashes of green. A muffled, sickening crack. And eyes. Blue, staring eyes. Sometimes they’re accusatory, broken with betrayal. Mostly they’re blank. Blank and dull and lifeless.

At first, when the panic would fade from his limbs and leave him weak and trembling but no longer on the edge of death, Peter would lurch to his feet and find himself on his knees in the bathroom, emptying his stomach into the toilet bowl. But he hadn’t eaten anything for a while and there was nothing left now but emptiness. He could close his eyes and press his lips together and wait for the nausea and faint dizziness to fade.

He tried not to sleep. He stared at the ceiling, the wall, the door. He kept his eyes open wide as the night crept past his window, until his head ached and his eyelids felt sticky and dry and irritated. He never let his gaze wander to the photos taped above his desk. He was tired of crying.

Aunt May did her best to hide it, but Peter knew she was struggling. She felt helpless. She hurt for him. But there was nothing she could do. No amount of Peter’s favorite foods, warm blankets, or hot chocolate could fix this.

It had been a week.

A week since Harry died. A week since Wade didn’t come.

Peter hadn’t been to school. He hadn’t touched his Spider-Man suit. He just lay in bed and didn’t sleep. 

Aunt May said that MJ and Ned had been by. Twice. He refused to see them. She tried to get him to eat, to watch TV, but was met with nothing but despondency. He had showered a couple of times at her insistence. He would sit in the cool of the tub and let his tears mix with the water until both had turned cold on his cheeks. And always, without fail, he would return to the nest of despair in the corner of his room.

He deserved to be there.

There was something wrong with Peter Parker. He was deficient in some way. Both times that he revealed himself, he drove away someone he loved. He wasn’t enough to make them stay. Or maybe, he was the _reason_ they left. 

It was a Monday morning when he came. Peter rolled in his bed at the sound of his Aunt’s familiar, soft little knock on the door. She came in even though he didn’t respond. He never responded. When she sat down on the edge of the mattress, reaching out to lay a gentle hand on his shoulder, he resisted the urge to flinch away. 

“There’s someone here to see you.” She spoke quietly, but her voice still sounded loud in the silence of the room.

Peter didn’t say anything.

“I think… I think you should talk to him, okay?” She was giving him a choice, but Peter didn’t have an answer for her. He wanted to be alone, but he doubted it would make any difference one way or the other. “I’ll… Just go ahead and send him in.”

Peter didn’t move from his position, curled half-way under the sheets. He could see the door from here.

A few moments after Aunt may left, another quiet knock sounded against the wood of his partially open door.

His eyes flickered lazily up as the door was pushed open, and Tony Stark stepped inside. Peter stared at him for a second, his heart stuttering into a faster pace when he saw the concern etched into the lines of his face. He pushed himself up into a sitting position, muscles aching in a sick, tired way as he propped himself against the headboard.

“Mr. Stark.” He mumbled, voice hoarse and quiet with disuse. He was suddenly aware of the fact that he must look like complete shit.

“Hey, kid.” He spoke much more gently than Peter was used to, closing the door behind him with a small click before stepping forward to pull Peter’s desk chair out and take a seat.

They looked at each other for a moment, Tony seeming unsure of what to say and Peter simply having nothing to offer.

Finally, the billionaire glanced away, making a show of looking at the posters on the walls. “Would’ve come sooner, but your Aunt is a tough cookie. She wouldn’t let me in to see you ‘till now.”

There was an uncomfortable moment of silence before Peter realized he should probably say something in response. “Yeah.” He cleared his throat, eyes falling to the sheets covering his lap. “What did you tell her?”

Tony sighed. “Said I was here to talk to you about that internship offer. Had to tell her that I knew you already had one, but considering the circumstances, I thought it was important that you at least knew your options.” Peter stiffened, his fingers tightening around the sheets, but Tony didn’t seem to notice. “That, and a healthy dose of flattery for you genius were enough to finally get me an appointment.”

His attempt at a joke fell dramatically flat. 

Another sigh, and Tony crossed one leg over the other, ran a hand through his dark hair, clearly uncomfortable with the situation. “Look. I’m really sorry about your friend.”

Peter kept his gaze down, lips pressed together in a tight line to keep the ragged pulsing hole of pain locked away inside.

“And, um…” He glanced back at the bedroom door, then moved his chair a little closer to Peter’s bed. He spoke his next words with a lowered voice. “I didn’t see what happened after you took off your mask that night.” Peter’s mouth felt dry. Too dry to swallow. “But it wasn’t your fault, alright?”

Peter’s nails dug into his thighs through the fabric of his sheets and sleep pants, sharp with anxiety. He could hear the blood rushing through his ears. He saw Harry stepping backwards and tumbling away, too quickly to stop.

“You have to know that, Peter.” Tony’s voice was unusually tender, soft with a pity that punched Peter right through the stomach. “None of it was your fault.”

He grit his teeth together, fighting the hot prick of tears at the edges of his tired eyes. The guilt was clawing at his insides, tearing him apart with a _physical_ pain. “It was.” He breathed out on half a sob, hunching over to try to keep it inside, but the words were dragged out anyway. “It was my fault.”

Tony made a choked, pained sound in the back of his throat. “No, kid. I know it feels that way, but you’ve got it wrong.” He reached out, and the touch of his hand on Peter’s shoulder felt like it burned. He had to know. He had to know what Peter did, because this _sympathy_ was killing him. Peter shook his head, vaguely aware that his cheeks had become warm and sticky with dampness. “He made a choice.” Peter let out a broken sound of protest, lips parting to tell the truth, to make Tony’s pity turn to ash in his mouth, but the Avenger didn’t let him speak. “You didn’t force him to jump off his balcony. He did that to himself, Peter.”

Peter’s head snapped up, pained whine cutting off in his throat before it could creep past his teeth. “What?”

Tony blinked at him. “It’s not your responsibility to shoulder. It was his choice to do what he did, no matter how much that hurts to hear.”

He shook his head, the air cool against the wet skin of his face. “No.” His ears were ringing. “His… Balcony?”

Tony frowned slightly, a small divot appearing between his eyebrows, his dark eyes looking older and more tired than Peter had ever seen them before. “There were witnesses. Said they saw him jump around four in the morning.”

“Wha… Witnesses?” Cold tingled across Peter’s skin, raising goosebumps along his arms. None of this was making sense.

“Just a couple people, happened to be walking by. A guy who lives across the street saw it from his window.” He let his hand fall away and rubbed at his own eyes, shoulders sagging as a weight seemed to settle over his whole body. “Fifty stories is a long way to fall.” He mumbled. 

Peter stared. “They…” He cleared his throat, but still couldn’t get his voice to rise above a dry whisper. “They found him at his own building?”

“Yeah.” Tony looked at him again, confusion passing over his features. “Monday morning. I thought you knew…?”

He was reeling, cast off into a swirling storm of uncertainty, but he managed to make an effort, scrambling for something to say. “I… Yeah, I knew he… That they found him. I didn’t know, um, where.” He stared down at his lap again, gaze glassy and distant.

He’d heard small snippets of the news here and there, through the thin walls of the apartment. He knew they found Harry’s body. Knew they suspected suicide. He knew the future of Oscorp was uncertain, and stocks were plummeting. But he’d tried to tune most of it out, because the way they talked about it on TV made him feel sick.

But this… This didn’t make any sense. A chill ran down Peter’s spine as he realized; someone must have moved Harry. Someone took him home, and dropped him from his own penthouse. Which meant someone found him.

Someone knew.

“Hey. Hey, Peter, it’s okay.” He was gasping, shoulders shaking as fear flooded his mouth with bitter adrenalin. “Sorry, okay? I shouldn’t have brought it up like that. I’m sorry.” Tony’s hand was on his arm again, trying to get his attention, but Peter was drowning in dark panic. He pulled his knees up to his chest and hid his face, taking deep, gulping breaths to try to calm himself down.

“Do you, um… Need me to go get your Aunt?” Tony sounded unsure. Maybe even a little frightened, and the strangeness of that was enough to shock Peter out of his spiraling anxiety. He managed to shake his head.

“N-No… No, I’m fine. Sorry.” He swallowed a sob and focused on the smell of his sheets, the warmth of the bed around him, trying to ground himself again.

“No need to apologize.” Tony told him, withdrawing his touch. He was silent after that, letting Peter get a hold of himself. He didn’t speak again until the young hero had uncurled himself and sat back against the headboard, face flushed and eyes hazy but no longer spilling tears through clumped eyelashes. 

“Are you… okay?” Peter shot him one dull, incredulous look, and Tony’s lips twitched. “Bad question. Sorry.” He took a deep breath. “I just meant, I’m worried about you.”

Peter’s eyes flickered down again. “Don’t be.” He muttered. He didn’t deserve it.

“I know he was your friend.” Tony continued, shifting in the wooden desk chair. “But don’t beat yourself up too hard. I mean, considering everything he did…”

Peter’s gaze flew back to his again, disbelief twisting a hard frown over his mouth. “Everything he did?”

Tony’s eyes were serious. “Believe me, I know all about following in your father’s footsteps, but this was a whole different kind of fucked up.”

“Don’t tell anyone.” The demand lashed out with desperate sharpness. “You won’t tell anyone, will you?”

“There are people who have to know, Peter.”

“No.” He surged forward, panic and determination tightening like a fist over his heart. He grabbed onto Tony’s wrist, squeezing so hard that the man flinched. “You can’t. Please, _please_ Mr. Stark. Please don’t.”

Tony stared hard at him, edges of his mouth turned down in dissatisfaction. “He tried to kill you. You would still protect him, after that?”

“ _Yes_.” Peter insisted, breathless. “It wasn’t his fault. He doesn’t deserve to be branded as a villain.”

“He made his own choices. You’re not responsible for that.” He paused, dark eyes narrowing slightly. “Is this about Deadpool?”

Peter dropped Tony’s hand like he’d been burned. There was a long, tense moment of silence. 

“What?” The word came out flat.

A muscle twitched in Tony’s jaw. “Does this have something to do with Deadpool and your ridiculous ideas about his innocence?”

Peter looked away, hands curling into fists on his thighs. “Get out.” He mumbled.

“Answer the question.” The Avenger’s voice was tight with contained anger. “Is it him?” Tense silence hung between them. “I don’t like what he’s doing to you Peter. He’s clouding your judgements of right and wrong.”

“Get. Out.” He hissed between his teeth, squeezing his eyes shut against the very _thought_ of him.

“No matter what you might think of him, he’s not a good guy. He’ll just end up hurting you.”

Peter whirled on him, springing to his knees, the blankets tangled around his legs. “GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY ROOM!” He screamed.

Tony startled back from Peter’s wild eyes, cloudy with rage.

“Get the FUCK out.” He tore his pillow from his bed and hurled it at Tony, hitting him across the face and causing him to stumble to his feet. “I make my own fucking decisions. I’m not a _fucking_ child!” He yelled, harsh words bouncing loudly off the walls and echoing through the small room. 

“Peter…” Tony struggled to speak, expression stunned.

“Stop telling me what to think.” He ripped himself from his bed, fury thrumming through his veins like a drug, all consuming. “And while you’re at it, stop watching me like I’m on _probation_ or some shit!” He kicked the chair over, making Tony jump back to avoid it. 

“Peter!”

“No. Shut up.” He backed Tony up against his desk, poison on his lips as he glared up at the man. “I don’t want you watching me anymore. I don’t want you telling me what to do, acting like you _own_ me and every other fucking thing in this city.”

Tony’s face was pinched with anger, too, his teeth flashing in a grimace. “This isn’t you, kid. This is–”

“DON’T fucking talk about him, and don’t come back here again.” Peter gave him a hard shove towards the door, making Tony stumble with a shocked grunt. “I don’t want to see you.” He spat, eyes hard. “Ever.”

Tony’s eyes flashed. He started to take a step closer.

“GET OUT!” Peter grabbed the mug from his bedside table and hurled it across the room. It shattered against the wall.

The door flung open with a startled gasp, Aunt May stepping in and immediately staring down at the mess of ceramic spread across the floor. “ _Peter_!”

“Fine.” Tony stepped around May, rigid with outrage as he walked out of the room. “Call me when you pull your head out of your ass.” He flung the words over his shoulder as he left, and a couple of moments later they could hear the front door slam shut.

Aunt May stared at him in stunned silence. “Peter Benjamin Parker. What the _hell_ was that about?”

Peter bent to pick his pillow up off the floor, anger and fear and so much fucking pain making his chest tight and his eyes burn. He fell onto his bed, not bothering to climb under the blankets, and hugged the pillow to his face as if he could suffocate it all away.

“Leave me alone.” He mumbled, words muffled in the cotton.

There was silence for a long time. Then she left the room. She came back, and Peter listened to her sweep up his broken mug, and clean the hot chocolate from his wall. She left again with a soft click of the door closing behind her, and Peter let his shoulders shake with the sobs he could no longer hold inside.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Peter didn’t want to be here.

He’d really rather be _anywhere_ but here.

The dated blue suit jacket hung loose around his shoulders, the sleeves and cuffs of the pants rolled up twice so it didn’t look like he was drowning in the worn fabric. Harry would tease him relentlessly about the ill-fitting clothes, tugging on the excess material until Peter grabbed his hands just to get him to stop. Would have teased him… He would have.

Peter chewed on his bottom lip until it stung, then prodded at the aching flesh with his tongue, swiping away the coppery taste that clung there. He picked anxiously at a loose thread on his pants, sandwiched between his Aunt and MJ on the unforgiving wooden pew. He hadn’t worn this suit since Uncle Ben’s funeral. With a vicious tug, snapping the navy thread from the unraveling seam, Peter decided that he _hated_ this suit.

Aunt May had made him come. He’d begged her not to, but she cried when she insisted that he get out of the apartment, get out of _bed_ , and he couldn’t stand to see her cry. Not on top of everything else. Then she tried to convince him that this might be what he needed to start getting closure, or something. Peter didn’t get his hopes up over that. There could be no closure for what he’d done.

So here he was, almost two weeks after his best friend died, sitting at his funeral. It seemed so soon to Peter. Far too soon. But apparently people were usually buried much more quickly, and this had been delayed because of the… Circumstances. 

He should have been wearing this suit at Harry’s graduation.

They had arrived just before the ceremony stared, slipping into the seats that had been saved for them in the second row (though Peter had wanted to sit in the back), because he had stalled for as long as possible before leaving the apartment. The trip downtown to the towering cathedral had worn his nerves down to sharp, sensitive little things, frayed enough to hurt at every unexpected sound or movement. It wasn’t so bad in the church, where the air was cool and the light streaming through the stained-glass windows dim with color and dust. It was quiet, too, ever since the old man in dark robes had begun speaking from the lectern on top of the raised dais.

Peter avoided looking at him, just letting the words echo softly around him without listening too hard. He kept his gaze down, unwilling to let it wander towards the front, towards the dark mahogany coffin that looked far too large sitting up there, surrounded by flowers and a blown-up photograph propped on a stand that made Peter’s stomach clench painfully whenever he caught a glimpse from the corner of his eye.

MJ was sniffling beside him, and Peter felt his shoulders tense as she raised a trembling hand to wipe at her eyes. It made his skin prickle, and a dark little thread of rage curled in his gut. He knew it wasn’t logical, but he couldn’t help feeling like she didn’t have the _right_ to be acting upset. If she was really so torn up about it, she should keep it the fuck inside like Peter was trying to do. At least Ned was keeping quiet, sitting glassy-eyed and still on the other side of MJ.

He’d come to see Peter a few days ago, after the incident with Tony. His Aunt let him in without even asking, and the resulting interaction had done nothing but aggravate Peter. He’d been embarrassed to be seen like that, with dirty hair and red-rimmed eyes, unable to leave his bed while Ned sat nearby like he was sick or something. He hadn’t known what to say. And neither had Ned. They felt so far apart now, like Ned was on the other side of an ocean that he could never hope to understand, and Peter didn’t even feel the need to look for a boat.

Everyone else in the cathedral were strangers except for a few Midtown High students from Harry’s class seated several rows back and an older woman that Peter vaguely recognized as Harry’s estranged maternal grandmother. They had never met, and even Harry hadn’t really known her. It made Peter’s chest ache, to know that Harry had no family left. He never really had anyone but his father, even when he was a child.

Guilt made Peter feel like there was something stuck in the back of his throat, and he almost wished he could be sick just to have something to choke on, to strip away the uncomfortable sensation.

Some time passed. More people spoke in solemn voices but Peter didn’t listen, focusing instead on the patterns of light on the marble floor. He was startled when the church came to life, people stirring and standing from their seats, the rustle of clothes and creak of wood filling the air with noise. Peter stood too, and hesitantly took the hands that were offered on either side of him. MJ’s hand was warm and Aunt May’s fingers gave his a squeeze. He was sure his own skin was cold and clammy with sweat, and he fought the urge to cringe away from their touch. Voices rose around him, and Peter bit down hard on his lip for something to focus on as the congregation spoke in unison, reciting some prayer that Peter never learned and that couldn’t have helped him even if he had.

He wiped his hands on his pants when they were finally released, taking a short breath to calm down. It seemed to be over now, the row in front of them filing out into the aisle, and Peter felt a bit of relief trickle through his veins, making him eager and anxious to get out of this church and return home, where it was dark and quiet and he could take this stupid suit off and go back to bed. 

He followed Aunt May out of their pew, but froze in the aisle, a sharp chill rippling through him when he saw that everyone was headed towards the _front_ of church instead of the back. Not towards the doors, but towards… He watched them file past, climbing the stone steps to the imposing display, each person pausing for a few moments to peer down, inside…

He could hear his pulse in his ears, feel the familiar clench in his chest, like giant hands pressing down, making it harder to pull in breath. But Aunt May was walking away and MJ was pressing in behind him and everyone else was edging into the aisle, forming a line, and there was no way to escape without disrupting the flow of traffic and Peter’s neck prickled like he wanted to run, like he wanted to leap onto the ceiling yards and yards above their heads where no one could see him and creep into the shadows like a real spider.

He tried to swallow, mouth dry, and followed Aunt May.

He pressed his shaking hands into his pockets, glancing around himself as if there were some way he could still make it out without being forced to… They inched closer, and Peter was aware of his racing heart. Aunt May glanced back at him before she climbed the steps, but Peter couldn’t see her. Couldn’t see anything but the shiny wood and deep red cloth draped over the edge. Couldn’t focus anywhere but the head of the coffin as May stepped aside, leaving an open space there.

Maybe this was his punishment. To be forced to face him again. To see what he did. 

Peter climbed the stairs.

There was white noise, a strangeness on his periphery, but everything stood out with sharp contrast as he stepped in close, and peered over the edge. His eyes were drawn immediately, involuntarily, to the face. His face. He was still and waxy looking, eyes closed, hair combed neatly over his forehead in a style that he never wore, and the hint of color in his cheeks made Peter’s stomach churn with confusion. His gaze skimmed downwards, searching for something beneath the smooth, crisp lines of the tailored black suit he was dressed in. Some deformity. Something… Out of place. But there was nothing.

And suddenly all he could see were Harry’s eyes. His _eyes_ , empty and staring and horribly, horribly blank. He imagined reaching out, running his hands over Harry’s abdomen and feeling it, how he killed him. He remembered the sharp edge of bone blunted through muscle and skin and clothes and there was the scent of vomit sharp and bitter in the air, the burn of acid in his throat, a sharp jolt and a muffled crack and cool air on his wet cheeks.

Peter was bent over at the waist, hands braced on his knees as he sucked in thick, heavy lung-fulls of air. The light was too bright, causing him to squint up at the cloudless sky. He was outside. Cars drove by and the air felt hot through his clothes, but it was easier to breathe. Easier to swipe his sleeve under his eyes and wipe away the weakness that had leaked out. 

“You look like shit.”

Peter straightened, whirling around to see who had followed him out. MJ offered him a tired smile, green eyes underlined by purpling bags, dark but not as dark as Peter’s. Her black dress was rumpled in the front, and he remembered pale fingers twisting in the fabric when they sat beside each other.

He let out a short, half-breath of laughter that sounded more like a scoff. “Thanks.”

He turned back to the street, tugging absently at his jacket as if it could be straightened from its perpetually wrinkled state. He felt MJ step up beside me, but he didn’t want to look at her. He knew what she was going to say.

Her voice was soft when she finally spoke the words, gentle and full of pure empathy. “I’m so sorry.” They still made him feel sick. Wrong. Because she didn’t know. Didn’t understand why he was like this. What he had done.

She thought he was sad because he and Harry had been _together_. Dating. Maybe even in love. It had looked that way, hadn’t it? From the outside? No one knew that it had only been Harry who felt that way. Who was kind and sweet and head over heels in love with Peter Parker. With Peter. Him. Not Spider-Man. Just Peter.

And Peter had kept him at arm’s length. Pushed him away while he fucked around with a masked mercenary. Got his father killed and exposed to the whole world. Ruined his whole fucking life and then took that away too. Killed him.

He killed Harry.

But it was easier just to let them all believe he was the heartbroken boyfriend. Easier to let them assume.

He’d taken too long to respond, so she kept going, reaching out to lay a hand on his arm. “I can’t imagine how hard this must be for you.” No. She couldn’t.

He resisted the urge to shrug off her touch. “Yeah.” He wasn’t sure what else to say. What could he say to her? She was as far away as Ned, too much between them now to bridge the gap. 

There was a pause when he should have said more. “We’re all really worried.” Concern crept into her voice now. Peter shrugged, but it didn’t dislodge her hand. He tried to ignore the way he ached undeniably for a different touch; larger, warmer. Leather and gunpowder.

She stepped part way in front of him, clearly trying to make eye contact, but he kept his gaze on the storefronts across the street. “Is there… Anything we can do?”

“What the fuck could you do?” He asked, and she flinched slightly at the bitterness in his words. 

“I don’t know… Um, bring you homework? Hang out and watch movies? We could… I mean, we’re here for you. You can… You can talk to us. To me.”

Peter let himself look down at her, lips twitching into a frown. “I don’t want to talk.” He didn’t. He didn’t want to do anything.

Her eyes looked watery, and in the next moment her lower lip was trembling, her fingers curling tighter around his bicep.

“Oh, Peter…” She surged forward before he could stop her, throwing her arms around his neck and pressing her face into his collar, solid and far too warm against him. She leaned into him, holding him close even though his body was tense and unmoving beneath hers. “It’ll be alright.”

Those words sparked something in Peter. Something sharp and _angry_ that raced across his skin like a flush. Because she didn’t know what the _fuck_ she was talking about. It wasn’t going to alright. It never would be.

He raised his hands to the small of her back and let his fingers curl into fists, catching the fabric of her dress in his grip. She made some muffled sound into his shirt, and Peter grit his teeth against the urge to rip her off him.

When she tipped her head up and slid one hand into his hair to caress the back of his skull, Peter let her. He let her pull him down until their lips met, and her mouth moved on his, soft and needy. She tasted like vanilla lip balm and tears. Her hair tickled his neck and her breasts felt strange where they pressed against his chest.

He let her kiss him until that bottled up feeling started to eat away at him, pressure pushing at the cracks until he gave into it. He forced her lips apart and shoved his tongue into the wet heat of her mouth, stealing her breath and tracing the shape of her teeth, not letting her have an ounce of control. And when he was done he bit down hard on her bottom lip until she whimpered. Then he raised his hands to her shoulders, and shoved her away from him.

MJ stumbled back with a huff of surprise, one hand rising automatically to press against her reddened mouth. She looked at him with wide, unsure eyes, and Peter felt venom on the back of his tongue. 

“So that’s the type of friend you are.” He stated, and watched her confusion deepen. He bared his teeth. “The type that swoops in on the grieving boyfriend, hoping to get a taste while he’s flat on his back.”

He watched the shock cross her face, the hurt and horror settle into the lines of her shoulders, and a sick satisfaction sank into the pit of his stomach. 

“Peter, I…”

“Don’t worry about it. I don’t blame you for seizing your chance.” He shoved his hands into his pockets, bitter desire to make her hurt cutting across his tongue, driving him to speak. “But you should know,” His mouth twisted into a grim smirk. “I doubt I’ll ever be lonely enough to let _you_ into my bed.”

He turned away from her stunned expression and left her on the cathedral steps, not bothering to tell his Aunt that he would walk home alone.

The rage that pounded through his veins was cold and clean and sharp. It felt good. Better than drowning in the fog of pain and guilt, trapped under the weight of it. He felt clear-headed for the first time in weeks. 

He felt like _doing_ something.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Peter locked himself in his room and got to work, only pausing when Aunt May threatened bodily harm if he didn’t eat something for dinner.

He dug his Spider-Man suit out of the back of his closet. He knew it did more. He knew it did, so he scoured every inch of it until he found the micro USB tucked under a folded seam in the neckline. He turned on the shiny silver laptop he hadn’t touched for two weeks and plugged it in. 

His screen went dark, a simple log-in prompt appearing in clean white letters. It was very Stark Industries. Peter chewed on his lip, tried a few simple hacking procedures that he knew wouldn’t work, and cursed the fucking _world_ for making his suit a personal pet project of the only man in the country who could set up cyber security better than the CIA. The chances were higher that he would randomly guess the correct log-in password than break through these firewalls all on his own.

And that gave Peter an idea. He didn’t need to hack his way in; all he needed to do was log in. And what did he have that no one else who would try something this crazy did? He had Tony Stark’s personal cell phone number.

It took some finagling, but he managed to shadow an IP address and piggy-back into one of Tony’s personal servers. From there, he was able to copy an automatic log in operation and bingo. He was in.

Red and blue graphics filled his screen, and Peter grimaced when he saw the name of the program plastered across the top banner: **Training Wheels Protocol**. Of course. Because Tony couldn’t be satisfied with just treating Peter like a toddler. He had to put it in writing, too.

He started clicking around, muttering eloquently about billionaire assholes under his breath. There appeared to be a series of tutorials helpfully organized by category and difficulty. His pulse raced as his eyes skimmed over the titles; web-shooter functions, suit modes, GPS capabilities, lens settings, emergency protocols, and user preferences. His suit was a fucking _computer_. Then he clicked on the last link in the menu, ‘Baby Monitor.’

His stomach turned, lips curling in disgust at the thumbnails laid out in neat rows across a clean grey background. He could see Harry in the most recent one, scowling face visible through the open panel in his Green Goblin mask, and the perspective was straight out of Peter’s memories, like it had been plucked right out of his head.

Or recorded through his eyes.

Seeing the videos made it real. Tony had all of this. He’d _watched_ while Peter… 

He clicked away with a low, sickened sound, unable to look any longer. This could never happen again. He couldn’t trust Tony not to keep peaking over his shoulder, recording his every move like he was on a NSA watch-list or some shit. His fingers flew over the keyboard, attempting every way he knew how to crack the server operations and erase the videos. Shut down the recording device. Prevent the suit from transmitting information to Stark ever again. 

It was all futile. With a grunt of frustration, Peter shoved the laptop away and snatched his mask from the floor. He yanked at the neck, fingernails digging into the seam, pushing his super strength until the fabric tore apart with a soft hiss and the wiring was exposed. Good thing Peter was obsessed with electrical engineering in middle school. He stared at the circuitry, identifying two wires that might carry outgoing information from the lenses to a tiny transmitter in the back. 

Unsure how else to turn the video recording on, Peter pulled the mask half-way down his face while awkwardly keeping his finger pressed to the two wires. He kept his head tilted back so nothing could be seen but the ceiling of his bedroom and closed his eyes to concentrate. If he focused, the hairs on the pad of his finger could detect a slight tingle of electrical current through the thin rubber insulation. It was coming from the… Yes, the left wire.

“Hello, Peter.”

He startled, tipping backwards off his chair with a small yelp as he scrambled to tear the mask off his head. He looked around wildly, heart pounding as he searched for the source of that cool, light voice.

There was no one. Nothing. Only the footsteps of Aunt May in the hall before a quiet knock sounded against the wood of his door. “Are you alright in there?”

He swallowed. “Yeah. Yeah, just a, uh, dream. I’m fine.” 

He didn’t move from his position, crouched on the floor near the edge of his bed. He listened hard for another minute, but heard nothing but the hesitant sigh of his Aunt as she lingered outside his door, and the muted goodnight she offered before her footsteps retreated back towards her bedroom. Peter glanced at his alarm clock, noting that it was already ten minutes past midnight. 

He straightened and stepped towards his desk in one smooth movement, seizing a pair of scissors and raising them to the mask still clutched in his hand. He cut the left wire.

After glancing at the laptop to make sure nothing on his screen had changed (it hadn’t), he slowly pulled the mask over his head again. Almost instantly, there was something different about his view through the lenses. Like always, the light in the room seemed slightly dimmer and the edges of things more distinct, easier to see. But now there was a soft blue glow in the upper right corner of his field of vision; the current time was displayed above another set of numbers which appeared to be coordinates. He turned his head left, then right, but the numbers never moved from their position.

“Good evening, Peter.”

He startled again, though he stifled his reaction to a small jerk this time. “H-Hello?” He whispered, padding silently towards the window so no noise would carry through the door.

“It’s nice to finally meet you.” He wasn’t sure how to react to that, but his lack of response didn’t seem to matter as the voice, just as calm and gentle as the first time it spoke, continued. “Now that your training program has begun, I’ve been activated to help you out.”

Peter stared at the floor, mind racing. “Training program?” Then, before the distinctly female voice could answer, “Are you an AI?”

“Yes, Peter. I am a scaled-down version of Mr. Stark’s artificial intelligence assistant, FRIDAY. I’m here to help you learn how to use your Spider-Man suit and assist you during patrol.”

He took a deep breath. Holy shit. Holy _shit_. His suit had a built-in AI. 

He really hated Tony Stark right now, but a tiny little part of him wept in gratitude for the man’s genius. “Do you, uh... Have a name?”

“No, Peter. Would you like to select one?”

He paused to consider that, brow furrowing slightly as he thought it through. He’d never named anything before. Was this like naming a pet? Should he choose something cute? Or should he go for clever, since this was a robot? No, it should be something simple. Easy. 

“How about Karen?” He suggested, turning to glance out his window. His kindergarten teacher had been named Karen. She was always soft and kind, and after Peter’s parents died he’d sometimes fantasized that she was his mother instead. Because she had always made him feel safe. And because she was afraid of flying, and never would have gotten on a plane.

“Very good, Peter. Thank you.” There was a short pause, during which Peter nodded because he wasn’t quite sure what else to do. “Before we get started, I should inform you of a small malfunction in my hardware.”

He blinked at that. “What malfunction?”

“Some of the wiring in your mask seems to have suffered damage, and I am no longer able to upload necessary information to Mr. Stark’s parent server.”

He let out a short breath of satisfied laughter. “No, I should hope not.”

There was another pause, just long enough to be felt. “Do you object to my communication with Mr. Stark’s server, Peter?” She sounded politely confused, and Peter marveled for a moment at her incredibly realistic vocal inflection.

“Yes.” He admitted as he stepped back towards his desk, voice low. “I don’t need to be watched over like an irresponsible child.” Suddenly, something else dawned on him. “Karen, do you also _receive_ information from Stark?”

“Yes, Peter.”

He grit his teeth together, hands curling into fists. “What sort of information?”

“Mr. Stark may edit access to the suit’s capabilities, update my software, or assume operational management in emergency situations.”

Peter felt like his blood was boiling. With cold, clear intent, he removed his mask. He dug his fingers into the fabric and ripped it apart where it had already repaired itself, reached for the scissors again, and cut the second wire that was connected to the transmitter.

Allowing himself a small, bitter smile, he slid the mask on again.

“Your suit seems to have undergone more damage, Peter.” He wasn’t sure it was possible, but he thought Karen’s voice might have contained a subtle hint of disapproval. “Shall I assume that this damage was intentional?”

Peter saw no reason to lie. “Yep.” He sat down at his desk and began to click through the suit’s program again.

“I am obligated to suggest that you deliver the suit to Mr. Stark for repairs.”

He scoffed. “That’s not gonna happen.”

“I am obligated to urge you to do so without delay. You will be in danger should an emergency occur and Mr. Stark cannot be contacted.”

He skimmed the instructional diagrams portraying the different settings he could choose for his web-shooters. “Can you access the internet?”

“Yes, Peter.”

“Can you make phone calls?”

“Yes.”

“Can you call nine-one-one if I need you to?”

A brief pause. “Of course.”

Peter nodded, as if that settled it. “Then move on, Karen. Can you do that?”

If AIs could sigh, Peter was almost sure he’d be hearing an aggravated breath in his ear just then. “Yes I can, Peter.”

“Wonderful. Now tell me about these suit modes. What the hell is ‘instant kill’?”

“I suggest starting with the suit tutorials, Peter.”

“Okay. Um…” How was he supposed to do that? There was nothing on his screen other than diagrams and minimal information. “Activate tutorial now?”

“I would suggest going somewhere with a little more room first.”

“Oh.” The kind, chipper request did make sense. He quickly shed his clothes and donned the rest of his suit, then turned off his desk lamp and made sure there was no trace of the fucking ‘Training Wheels Protocol’ on his laptop. He crept to the window and climbed out as silently as he always had, the familiarity of it all like a dull ache in his bones.

When he wall-crawled a safe distance away and shot his first web, swinging away into the warm night air, it was a relief as much as a painful reminder of why he hadn’t worn the suit since that night. As he swung, he noticed the coordinates at the edge of his vision changing by fractions of degrees. He only got a couple of blocks away, his muscles quickly re-acclimating to the rhythmic strain and release, before Karen spoke again.

“Since you are traveling at night in a residential area, might I suggest Stealth Mode until you find somewhere more private?”

“Stealth Mode?” That sounded interesting. “Sure. Why not.”

A small letter “S” appeared in the upper left corner of his visual field, but otherwise nothing seemed to change. 

“Your webs will now dissolve within thirty seconds, so please proceed with caution.”

“Oh. Cool.” So it would be harder to track him, if anyone knew what to look for… Kind of neat. Though Peter had expected more from Stealth Mode.

He continued on in search of taller buildings, making his way across the bridge and into Manhattan. He spotted a skyscraper that he knew had a large, clear rooftop and headed towards it. He caught himself on the reflective side of the building, prepared to climb the rest of the way up, but froze at what he saw in the window.

Spider-Man stared back at him, but it was a different Spider-Man. His suit was black, the webbing pattern and eye lenses a matted dark grey, almost indistinguishable. He blended into the darkness of the New York sky, almost enough that Peter might not have noticed his reflection if he weren’t staring right at it. 

“Holy shit.” He breathed, turning his head slightly to one side, then the other, and watching as this dark Spider-Man did the same. 

“Would you like to return to your regular settings now?”

“No.” He stared at himself for another moment, letting the sight settle into his skin. “Leave it.”

He climbed to the top of the building and Karen proceeded to take him through the suit’s tutorials. It was all incredibly user-friendly, and Peter picked up each new skill with ease. The exploding web-nets were a little hard to handle at first, and he was hesitant to use any of the ‘permanent’ webbing even though Karen assured him that it would, in fact, dissolve within two to five years. 

His greatest concern was forgetting all the different options available to him, but Karen showed him how to call a menu up in front of his very eyes. He could flip through the different modes and functions to his heart’s desire, and all he had to do was speak the words and it would happen. Like magic.

Tony Stark might be a dick, but he was a smart dick.

When he left the roof to try out his new tricks on an actual criminal or two, Peter kept his suit in Stealth Mode. He liked it. It made him feel… 

Dangerous.

It didn’t take long to stumble across a shady business deal that seemed to involve a whole duffel-bag of product (Peter guessed drugs, since there weren’t the tell-tale lumps of heavy weaponry, and Karen helpfully confirmed). There were three men. Two of them visibly armed. They stood in front of some artfully scrawled graffiti; _Crawl til dawn, on my hands and knees. God damn these bite marks deep in my arteries._

Peter was creeping silently down the wall behind the two armed men’s backs, going unnoticed by the third who faced him, when Karen unexpectedly informed him that all three had previous records. A small document icon appeared in the bottom right of his visual field, which he assumed meant he could look at the records if he wanted to. 

“Thanks.” He breathed into his mask, pausing to crouch just above eye-level on the dark brick wall. “But maybe don’t distract me when I’m this close to a fight unless it’s fucking important.”

“My apologies, Peter.” The document icon disappeared. 

Money was being exchanged and the duffel bag handed over, so Peter took that as his cue to jump in and rile things up a bit. He slipped off the wall, landing fluidly on the balls of his feet, and padded silently towards the little pow-wow. He got within two yards of them without attracting any attention, meaning these idiots were exceptionally unobservant or Stealth Mode worked really fucking well.

“Well, if it isn’t the most bitchin’ party-planning committee in the whole damn school.” Predictably, all three of the drug dealers wheeled around to face him, hands flying to the hilts of their guns and, in the case of the third man, reaching back under his jacket for the grip of a – knife, graciously outlined in blue as he drew it from his belt. 

“Did I miss the meeting? Because I had some pretty kick ass ideas for the prom.” The words felt hollow on his tongue. Wasted.

“Who the fuck are you?” Grunted villain #1, a tingle of warning shooting down Peter’s neck as he pointed his gun.

Peter planted his hands on his hips and sighed. “You know what? Let’s skip the witty banter. I’m not in the fucking mood.”

“Spider-Man?” Questioned #3, the dumbass who only brought a kitchen knife to the gun show. 

Peter shot a finger gun in his direction. “Bingo, baby.” He flipped his already extended wrist, shooting a quick web to take the knife out of commission, and leapt into action without hesitation. He kicked #1 in his gaping face and seized #2 by the shoulders as he landed, twisting to get him under one unyielding arm and flip him hard onto the concrete.

There was a shout of pain, the man on the ground left writhing where he landed, but Peter was already moving on. He grabbed #1 by the front of his shirt and slammed him up against the bricks, head whipping aside to catch sight of #3 sprinting towards the mouth of the alley.

“Let’s try out a web net.” He extended his free wrist and shot, a small white ball of web exploding beautifully into the air just a couple of feet from the fleeing man and enveloping him in a veritable cage of synthetic fiber. He fell hard, unable to extend his arms to keep from slamming awkwardly down on his shoulder and hip with a short yelp.

A low hum of warning warmed Peter's neck and he turned to #1 again, raising his hand to catch the fist that was thrown towards his face. The man bared his teeth in a grimace, but there was still a glint of aggression in his eyes.

"What's with the new look, you tryin' to scare us? Everyone knows your sidekick is the one who deals the real damage."

Peter glowered, anger sparking hot and powerful in his limbs, and squeezed until he felt something crack under his palm.

The man screamed, yanking hard against Spider-Man's hold until his mangled hand was released. "What the fuck? Holy shit that fucking _hurts_ man oh my god!"

He yanked the dealer forward and slammed him back again, the impact successfully shutting him up, then threw the man aside and let him sprawl on the ground. He aimed another careless web net in his direction, finding this way much easier than taking the time to web someone up by hand. 

The sound of a metallic click and a sharper tingle traveling unpleasantly down his spine had Peter whirling towards #2. He had climbed to his knees, albeit shakily, and was aiming his handgun in Spidey's direction. Peter raised his hand, but stumbled over the movement when he remembered his webs were still on the net setting. He was forced to move then, instinct pushing him into a tight forward tuck as a gunshot rang out, echoing off the walls. 

When Peter landed, he was pissed. "Regular webs." He spat out belatedly, a bit of vindictive irritation coloring his tone as he kicked the gun out of the man's hand. He didn't stop, aiming another sharp kick to his chest. #2 toppled backwards with a pained gasp and a rattling hack, clearly having had the breath knocked right out of him.

Peter stalked forward and crouched over him, landing a punch to his nose, feeling it crack under his knuckles. The man's head snapped to the side with a grunt. He was still struggling for air. Fueled by the rage boiling beneath his skin, Peter hit him again. And again. There was blood, dark and thick against pale skin. It looked like oil where it splattered onto the pavement.

"Peter." Karen's composed voice interrupted him, and Peter realized he was panting beneath the mask. "Mr. Johnson appears to have suffered a broken clavicle, nose, and jaw, as well as a concussion."

He stared down blankly, taking a moment to realize that Karen was talking about the man lying unmoving, probably unconscious below him. It took him another moment to realize he didn't care.

'Mr. Johnson' had chosen to break the law tonight, and Spider-Man stopped him. Why was it his responsibility to pull his punches? Why should he care whether the criminals he left for the incompetent NYPD had a few more broken bones? It didn't matter. They'd be out on the streets again in a few months. Maybe weeks. At least this way he might actually leave an impression.

Peter stood up, fingers twitching towards the hidden pocket where he usually kept his phone before he remembered. "Karen, call the police and tell them where to pick these guys up."

"Yes, Peter."

He didn't bother webbing #2 down. He wouldn't be moving anytime soon.

Peter moved to the nearest wall and climbed up, swift and sure on the balls of his feet and pads of his fingers. When he crouched on the edge of the roof and looked out over the city, listened to the cars and the people and the distant sound of sirens, he felt… Good.

Maybe not good. Not really. But he felt powerful. And that was better.

Peter stayed out until dawn, keeping himself busy. And when he climbed back into his bedroom, shed his suit and got into bed, it wasn’t easier to fall asleep. But it was easier not to think while he lay there, staring up at the ceiling as the sunlight crept across his room.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Peter was back at school on Tuesday. 

Not for classes. He’d managed to convince Aunt May that would be a waste of time, since there were only three days left until the end of the semester. No, he was just here to drop of a half-finished paper and collect a few final assignments that he would never touch again let alone complete.

There was no point, anyway. He’d still get A’s in all his classes (except maybe Spanish) even after missing final exams. He was just going through the motions so May wouldn’t make good on her threat to start bringing Peter to work with her.

He didn’t think he could survive going back there. To the first place they met. Just the thought of it made him want to scream and cry and punch something. 

He didn’t bother wearing his glasses. Hadn’t worn them in a while, actually. Who had he thought he was fooling? Contacts were common as fuck. It’s not like he was really protecting his identity by always wearing glasses. No one would ever dream up the ridiculous idea that weak little Peter Parker could be Spider-Man anyway. Not in a million fucking years.

He almost made it out without speaking to anyone, unharried if not unnoticed, when the final bell rang. Peter cursed under his breath, caught in the middle of the hallway and too far from the doors to slip outside before students were flooding out of their classrooms.

He put his head down and kept walking, hoping to avoid unnecessary attention. He hadn’t ever been particularly well known at school (except perhaps as Flash’s favorite punching bag), but he had a feeling that was different now, after… What happened.

He was almost to the front doors when his neck prickled, and Peter’s stomach sank. He knew it was Flash before he’d been pinned up against the nearest lockers, because speak of the devil and… Well, you know.

He glared up at the blonde’s sneering face, out of fucking patience for the constant bullshit. “What?” He drawled before Flash could make one of his ill-conceived puns that he thought were insulting. “Miss me too much since I’ve been gone?”

“Naw.” Flash’s grin was ugly, and Peter sensed an unease in the crowd that was gathering around them. “Figured you could use a break, all things considered.”

Peter’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Considering?” The word crawled past his clenched teeth.

“Yeah, y’know.” Flash shrugged casually, though his fist stayed curled tight around the fabric of Peter’s t-shirt. “Dead boyfriend and all.”

Something white hot built in Peter’s chest like a pressure cooker, pushing out until his mouth curled into a snarl. And Flash was leaning in, putting his disgusting lips close to Peter’s ear and speaking softly.

“Well, vacation’s over, Parker. Your sugar daddy isn’t here to protect you anymore.”

Peter saw red. He shoved Flash. Hard. 

The taller boy stumbled backwards into a group of spectators, a short sound of surprise on his lips. His expression quickly twisted into something angry, though nowhere near as furious as Peter was. This was usually the part where he ran away, but this time he stood his ground. He let Flash stand up again, let him take a swing at Peter’s face.

He ducked easily under the punch, and Flash’s fist slammed into the lockers with a cringe-worthy bang. 

“Ah, fuck! You broke my fucking hand, you creep!” Flash whirled on him, livid now, his chest heaving with it. “You’re fucking _dead_.”

Peter laughed.

The sound was cold and clear and sharp. Off. But Peter couldn’t bring himself to care. “Try me.”

Flash came out swinging again, and it was almost sad how ridiculously easy it was for Peter to avoid it. To bring the larger boy to his knees with a well-placed kick to the shin. There were gasps from the audience when Peter kicked him again, in the balls this time. 

Flash doubled over with a grunt, one hand landing on the ground to steady himself while the other pressed protectively over his groin. Peter bent down with a sneer, grabbed a handful of Flash’s thick hair and yanked. “What was that you were saying?” He tilted his head to the side, as if he were listening for something. “I didn’t hear you the first time.”

“Peter!” Someone was shoving through the crowd, sharp voice carrying over the general murmur of shock and amusement. He ignored her.

He leaned in close, pulling at Flash’s hair until his head was bent backwards at an uncomfortable angle, throat distended, exposed. “Care to repeat yourself?” He growled.

“ _Peter_.” MJ hovered near his elbow, a second away from grabbing him. 

He ignored her in favor of shoving Flash’s face down into his raised knee, feeling the jolt of impact with a deep-seated satisfaction. He relished the whimper of pain as the jock tried to shove him away one-handed, lip split and bleeding all over his chin, staining his teeth red.

MJ seized his arm and tried to drag him away.

He let her, but quickly tore out of her grip and walked on his own.

“What the fuck, Peter?” She sounded mad. And frightened.

“What?” He snapped, not looking at her as he headed outside.

“What the hell was that?”

He sniffed, fingers clenched into fists at his sides. “Something I should have done a long time ago.”

“Bullshit.” Her voice trembled, but there was steel in her words. “That’s not you, Peter.”

He wheeled around to face her, jerking to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk. He seethed. His pulse thrummed with a fire that burned out of control. “Who fucking says?”

She shook her head, green eyes glistening wetly as she glared. “No. That’s not the Peter I know.”

He blinked at her. “No. It’s not.” He agreed. He turned to walk away. 

“But the Peter you know is dead.”

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Song Credits:

Chapter Title:  
Come Home – Placebo  
Lyrics:  
Damn These Vampires – The Mountain Goats

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************


	3. I Have Grown Weary On My Own

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dearest readers,
> 
> I keep trying to make my chapters shorter and it keeps... Not working out.  
> I hope you don't mind.
> 
> I'm woefully behind on responding to your lovely comments, but I want you to know that I read them _all_. Each and every one has an impact, and I so appreciate your feedback. It's my motivation.  
>  I do it all for you <3
> 
> Please see the end of the chapter for song credits.

**Wade**

**[White]**  
**{Yellow}**

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

_Take me home, tend to me. Baby, lay me down easy. For I have grown weary on my own._  
_All alone. I wither and I bruise, I run my mouth like a fool._  
_I’ll be so quiet for you. Look like a child for you. Be like a shadow of a shadow of a shadow for you._

_I’ll be so still for you. Like a dead dog for you. Lay there ‘til my eyes pop._  
_All for you._

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Libya was hot.

{Hot as fuck. Jesus, do we still have dust in our ass crack?}

[If Wade had fucking showered before rushing off to stow away on the first flight out...]

"I'm showering now, shit face." Wade muttered, throwing a towel over the bathroom mirror before he began to strip his suit off, the leather stiff and sticky with dried fluids and the encrusted dirt of almost a month in the desert.

{The dust and the sweat and the blood sort of combined to make a paste. That was gross.}

[You don't say?]

"Hey, we don't need your lip. Shut your whore mouth, White." Wade twisted the knobs until hot water sputtered out of the shower head, almost instantly permeating the room with cloying steam. 

{Yeah, bitch. It's your fucking fault we're in this mess in the first place.}

[No. It's _your_ fault for dragging us back here. Both of you are complete imbeciles.]

{No, you're the imbecile you shit head mother fucking coward running off with your tail between your legs like a little pussy just because a tiny itsy spider tore out our heart and stomped all over it. Well you should've known it was too late to get our heart back. I mean, it grows back or whatever but he still _owns_ it and so of course it was a fucking stupid idea to run away like those poor idiots in Final Destination. You know he's gonna get you no matter what. You can run but you can't hide. That anthropomorphized live wire is still gonna come electrocute you in your bathtub.}

[I think you lost sight of your original point.]

{...What was I talking about?}

Wade tried to ignore them, standing under the steady stream of water with his head bent, watching the blood and dirt wash in brown rivulets down his desecrated skin and swirl around the drain. He stayed there for a long time before grabbing the motel's complimentary soap and scrubbing absently across all the surfaces of his aching body. 

They were back. Back in New York. Wade hadn't been sure he'd ever return, but... In the end, he hadn't really had a choice.

They'd been fine for a while, slaughtering warmongers left and right and never thinking. Never feeling. Wade didn't care which side of the civil war they were on. If they enslaved child soldiers, if they raped wives and daughters and pillaged the food and supplies of civilians, Wade killed them. His blades drank the blood of hundreds of men, all of them poor excuses for human beings. Or victims of war time too weak to maintain their shattered remnants of humanity. What did it matter? They were bad. Wade killed them. The lawless land, the methodical fighting was a balm to his aching soul, but it hadn't lasted.

White only kept control for a few days. Once they'd settled into a rhythm, Wade took over again. He maintained the routine. He went through the motions. But he couldn’t hold on to the numbness. 

He was miserable. Just… A complete fucking mess. Yellow didn’t even get excited about cutting off heads anymore and Wade found himself collapsed in the rainforest, sobbing his eyes out at a huge, scary-ass looking red and black spider he found on the side of a tree.

It was a bad time.

And so even though he knew it might end up hurting him more, even though he knew Peter was undoubtedly better off without him and he was just stepping back into one of the most fucked disaster relationships of his life (and he’d had many), he decided to come back. Because he couldn’t keep going on that way.

He couldn’t keep pretending that there wasn’t a Peter-shaped hole in his body. That’s how fucking hollow he felt.

Wade heaved a weary sigh as he turned the water off and ripped the shower curtain aside to step out, dripping water onto the floor as he walked naked into the bedroom. He didn’t have a spare suit on him, and his mind was too muddled right now to remember which of his safe houses were stocked (hence the motel), so he would have to settle for sweats and a hoodie. Perfect mid-June wardrobe.

{The sarcasm is palpable over here.}

[You don’t have to point that out. Our readers aren’t complete idiots.]

{Well, they’re still here reading about this ugly fuckhead…}

[They enjoy his pain.]

“Would you _please_ shut the hell up?” Wade grumbled bitterly, tossing dirty clothes out of his duffel bag, careful to set his sniper rifle and custom set of combat knives on the bed. He was tired off the boxes. Tired of everything. He pulled out a wrinkled pair of Adidas sweats that only had a little bit of blood on them and tugged them up over his legs until the waistband settled low on his hips. 

He sank onto the foot of the bed then, not bothering to put on the sweatshirt-that-smelled-like-death until he had to leave the room. He reached for the remote and switched the TV on, unwilling to catch a glimpse of his reflection in the darkened glass surface. He hardly paid attention once the morning news

{Morning? Wow.}

started blaring from the crappy little built in speaker. He reached for his Desert Eagle, sliding it from its spot on the nightstand and settling it in his lap. He kept his hands busy, dissembling the pistol and setting each piece aside with delicate care to clean and oil with some of his spare supplies. The movements were habitual and required no thought on Wade’s part, but were still successful at dulling the constant noise in his head. There was something… Soothing, about the routine.

He was on his third go around when White decided to be a little bitch again.

[So what’s the plan, Heathcliff?]

Wade took slow, even breaths and kept his gaze focused on his ungloved hands. His skin looked particularly bad today.

[Seriously. What do you think is going to happen? You’re going to waltz in, all _Lucy I’m home_ and he’s going to – What? Leap into your arms and kiss you hello? Have dinner waiting on the table with a nice scotch on the rocks?]

{You think Petey can cook?}

[I think Peter hates our guts.]

Wade grunted, teeth gritting against the pain as he blinked down at his fingers, wrapped tightly around the grip of the trench knife that was buried to the hilt in his thigh.

“Fuck.” He muttered. “This was my last pair of clean pants.”

{Semi-clean.}

“Whatever.” He gave the knife a little twist and hissed out between his teeth. 

[You’re avoiding the question.]

“Is it working?”

[Not this time. Clearly.]

{What question?}

“It’s half working.” Wade gave the grip another little nudge, edging the blade closer to his femoral artery just to feel the surrounding nerves light up with agony.

[Jesus, you’re such a child. Both of you. You came back here all half-cocked without a plan, and this is going to end in disaster. When you’re a sobbing, bleeding mess pissing yourself in the darkest corner of this wretched city, I hope you know I won’t – ]

“Shut up.” Wade wrenched the knife from his leg and tossed it aside, attention sharply focused on the television set.

“– here at New York’s Oscorp headquarters. Investors have been jumping ship since news of the board’s controversial vote electing Charles Standish as the company’s temporary CEO.” The reporter, a blond woman with startlingly pink lipstick and a well-tailored suit jacket, was pictured standing outside the front entrance of Oscorp Industries downtown, holding a microphone at chest level. Flashes of activity on the edges of the frame hinted at more reporters and paparazzi hanging around the building.

“Standish is known for his risky decisions during the Alchemax trials nearly a decade ago, and it’s clear that he still carries that reputation despite years of dedicated service on the company’s board of directors.”

{Why the fuck do we care about this?}

[Shut up.]

There was a strange sinking in Wade’s stomach, like he’d swallowed a grenade and he was just waiting for the pin to drop.

“He has announced plans to work closely with Dr. David Lowell, one of Oscorps lead scientists, on a new project that they hope will settle the company’s tumultuous stance in the world market. With stocks still falling nearly a full month after Harry Osborn’s alleged suicide, it is unclear whether the company will be ready to…”

{Oh… fuck.}

There was a ringing in Wade’s ears. A panicked tingling at the tips of his fingers, like the blood had rushed out of him. 

“James Cromwell has more information back at the station. Once again, I’m Angela Reams, and this is WCNY channel forty-eight, the seven o’clock news.”

Some sort of fancy graphics swept across the screen, accompanied by a brief, dramatic flare of music. A man appeared sitting behind a giant desk. He was wearing a suit and some heavy-handed concealer makeup. The coffee mug sitting on the desk beside him was almost certainly empty.

“The NYPD are expected to announce an official cause of death sometime in the next week or so. The investigation has taken much longer than we would usually see in cases like this due to the highly influential position of the deceased. Harry Osborn was, for all intents and purposes, the chief executive officer of one of the largest pharmaceutical and technology giants in the world.”

A rectangular image of Harry appeared in the upper right quadrant of the screen, all perfectly tossed hair and glittering white teeth. The smile didn’t reach his eyes, but they were still beautiful in their gray-blue steeliness. Guarded. Sad. 

[He’s… dead?]

“Sh.” Wade hushed him, straining to keep listening over the pounding of his pulse. The blind racing terror that chilled his veins.

“The FBI are said to have aided in the investigation, though the extent and purpose of their role in the case remains unconfirmed. Officials have been tight-lipped regarding the details of the case, but an inside source has lead us to believe that there is additional evidence pointing towards suicide beyond the two witnesses who saw Harry Osborn jump from his penthouse balcony in the early hours of the morning on May sixteenth.”

Wade felt ill. He couldn’t wrap his mind around this, around what it meant…

{It means our competition is finally out of the picture. Thank our lucky fucking stars, now there’s no pretty-boy rich model bitch to steal Peter’s attention away from us!}

Wade snatched the trench knife from the duvet and stabbed the sharp end into his left eye socket, eyelid snapping shut on reflex just before the blade pierced his sclera. 

“AH! Ah fuck… Motherfucking shit.” He curled inwards at the waist, immediately yanking the knife out (because feeling steel tug at the muscles in the back of his eye made his skin fucking crawl) and pressing a hand to his mangled, leaking eye.

[Well. That was an overreaction.]

“No it fucking wasn’t.” He hissed through a clenched jaw, self-disgust climbing up his throat like vomit.

Harry Osborn was dead. He had _killed himself_ the day before Wade got on a plane and left town for a whole month.

A whole. Month.

Wade had fucked up, hadn’t he?

He had really, _really_ fucked up.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

{Are you sure this is the best plan?}

“We can’t just show up at his apartment.” Wade muttered, pausing at the ledge of another rooftop to peer around himself and listen hard for any sign of fighting or a certain red and blue hero. “We’ve never done that before. It would be creepy. And invasive.”

[Unlike, say, full psycho stalking a boy for weeks? Watching him through his bedroom window and following him around with binoculars?]

{Okay. Now just hold on a fucking second. That was out of _love_.}

“No, no.” Wade shook his head, as if he could jostle the boxes onto a different subject of conversation. “Enough of that.”

He had decided to seek out Spidey, rather than Peter (he still thought of them as two separate people sometimes, even though he’d gotten much more used to the fact that they were, quite fittingly, one and the same). It was a more comfortable setting to approach him in, out on the streets in the dark, both protected by their alter-egos. And it would be downright awkward, not to mention quite presumptive and rude, if Wade just appeared in Peter’s bedroom window with no warning whatsoever.

[It’s not like you have the best track record with relationship decisions… That’s all I’m saying.]

“Yeah, that’s all.” He muttered, shaking his head slightly as he shot a grappling hook at the next rooftop and continued on his search of the city. “You’re not trying to convince me to leave again or knock me down with crippling doubt and self-loathing.”

{Ha, well joke’s on you! We already hate ourselves and doubt every decision we ever make! So go suck on those big stainless steel balls.}

[I am… slain by your infallible logic.]

“Shut up.”

[Really, you never cease to strike me down with your cunning wit and –]

“Shut _up_.” Wade hissed again, treading lightly as he crept towards the familiar sounds of a fight on the other side of the apartment building.

His heart stuttered towards a faster pace in his chest as he considered the possibility that it could be _him_ just a few yards away and quite a few stories down. Spider-Man. Peter.

It felt like he’d seen him just yesterday. A few hours ago. Watched him cry through his bedroom window (and oh gods… It made so much sense now. Sick, awful sense). But at the same time he was so acutely, painfully aware of the time that had stretched out between them. The weeks that he’d been gone. The hours that had dragged by since the last time they touched. _Kissed_. They cut at him, guilt sharper than knives.

{It might not be him…} Yellow reminded him, hesitant with hope and dread.

“No, it might not be.” He clung to that possibility in an attempt to keep up a poor approximation of calm. 

[But it probably is.]

It probably was. Wade knew Spidey’s patterns. He knew where he usually started his patrols and what areas he gravitated towards at what times depending on the weather, his mood, and the level of crime activity that night. Wade knew the weather and how active the baddies were this evening, and he could guess at Peter’s mood. Even if his guess made him grind his teeth until his jaw ached and crave a bullet to the brain.

He crouched just behind the ledge when he finally reached it, keeping himself hidden as he peered down into the alleyway below to catch a glimpse of the violent-sounding altercation.

Dark figures moved in a flurry, bouncing off the closed in brick walls, and Wade quickly counted six of them. There was no flash of red or blue, and disappointment lingered with relief in his stomach as his muscles relaxed slightly. He briefly considered going down and trying to break up the fight, but he wasn’t really doing that anymore and he wasn’t exactly confident in his current ability to stop someone without killing or permanently maiming them.

He should just get up and move along, keep searching, but the longer he watched, the more the scene below resolved into something recognizable. And distinctly foreign.

[Is that…]

One of the dark figures was moving in a very familiar way, twisting around a man with a knife to kick out hard at his wrist, making him crumple to the ground with a yelp and a groan, knife clattering against cement. Then the figure flipped into the air and landed on one of the walls where he crouched, extending a hand and shooting some sort of exploding net at a man who was running away. It enveloped the runner and he fell hard, messily, elbow cracking audibly when it hit the ground. Then the one on the wall sprung off, wrapped his beautiful thighs around the neck of a third man, and shot a web at a fourth. The web stuck to his shoulder and Spider-Man yanked, pulling him _into_ the air and slamming him roughly against the opposite wall. The one choking between the grip of his legs stumbled to his knees, face purpling in the dim light that filtered from the windows above.

{Holy. FUCK.}

“Oh my gods…”

{That’s Spidey!!! That’s our Baby Boy!}

[A _dark_ Spidey.]

Wade watched, jaw dropped in shock, as Dark Spidey spun off the collapsing man’s shoulders, planted his hands on the ground, and executed a stunning round-off followed by an aerial backflip, kicking guy number five in the face on his way down. He turned sharply, grabbing the man by the front of his shirt before he could drop and slamming him up against the bricks. He proceeded to punch him. Once, twice. A series of vicious blows that left him sagging at the knees, eyes already swelling shut and nose and lips a bloody mess. Spidey let him fall and turned to the last one kneeling. He gripped a handful of hair in his fist and slammed the criminal’s face down into his raised knee, causing him to drop like a stone. 

{Um… New Spidey is really fucking hot.}

Wade choked a little on his own spit, reaching up to press a palm against the pulsing column of his throat. He was… Nervous and sad and guilty and aroused all at once. It was a bit overwhelming. 

Spidey

{ _Peter_ }

stalked towards the mouth of the alley, footsteps silent and gate smooth, gracefully predatory, pausing only to aim a harsh and unnecessary kick at the stomach of the man caught in his web net.

He disappeared around the corner of the building and Wade sprung to his feet, heart racing as he took off towards the opposite edge of the roof, quick and stealthy but desperate not to lose Spidey in the labyrinth of the city.

{Where did he get the sexy new suit? And the cool new web toys?}

[He’s angry.]

“He’s hurt.” Wade muttered, whole chest aching with cold sharp shame. 

{And whose fault is that? Oh, that’s right, _yours_.}

[We should have stayed away. We’ll only hurt him more. And he must hate us now; do you really think you’ll be able to survive his disgust?]

“Sh.” Wade skidded to a halt, darting down to crouch behind a utility shed as a dark figure crept over the edge of the next building’s roof and swung onto light feet to stand, silhouetted by the dim moonlight. 

Now that he was closer, Wade could see the familiar pattern of the Spider-Man suit, a dark grey barely distinguishable from the black fabric beneath. Even the eye lenses were a smoky coal color, and he wondered briefly how Peter could see out of them. He watched as Spidey began to pace along the ledge, gate unhurried though the lines of his body remained tight and rigid with contained energy. He looked…

[Dangerous.]

Dangerous and restless and sexy as hell. Wade swallowed back his self-disgust as arousal curled low in his gut. A frown twitched under his mask when he realized he could hear Peter’s voice faint on the wind, and he crawled forward a yard and a half so he could hear, keeping low to the ground to remain out of sight. 

“Fucking drug dealers… They weren’t even armed this time.” Spidey spun on his heel and paced back the other way, one hand planted casually on his hip. “So they were working for Fisk? Can’t expect the charges to stick then.”

Unease trickled into Wade’s veins as he watched, a low buzzing dread settling under his skin. 

Peter seemed to pause, cocking his head slightly to one side as if he were listening to something. “Yeah. Go ahead and do that.” He resumed his pacing. “Nope. No. Okay, yeah. Make that our default for now.”

[Oh…. Fuck.]

Wade felt untethered, like the ground beneath him had ceased to be solid and he was suddenly falling through space with nothing to hold on to. Because Peter was talking to himself. Peter was talking to himself like _Wade_ talked to himself and now he felt ill. Shaky and panicky and sick.

{Oh my god we broke him! Holy shit we really are contagious. Petey’s lost his precious, precious mind!}

[Wouldn’t you if one of your boyfriends was MIA and the other killed himself?]

“Oh my gods. Ohmygodsohmygodsohmygods oh fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.” This couldn’t be happening. He couldn’t have _broken_ Peter, could he? He stumbled to his feet, blind with anxiety, and took a couple of faltering steps forward.

Spidey’s head snapped in his direction, and before he knew what was happening the hero had shot a web and swung towards him, feet punching hard into Wade’s stomach as he pinned the mercenary back against the shed.

For a long moment, they both froze, staring at each other. Spidey’s mask was blank but he was so _close_ and they were touching and Wade could _smell_ him and feel the heat of his body. It took every ounce of self-control he had not to grab the little spider by his thighs and tug him in close, flip their positions to press him back against the glazed wood and just… Just… _Have_ him.

His ragged intake of air broke the silence, and he could feel himself trembling. “H-Hey, Spidey… Peter.”

Spidey jerked back as if he’d been slapped, and suddenly all contact between them was torn apart, leaving Wade cold and shaken. Peter landed several feet away, stance tense and defensive. Wade swallowed hard and straightened up so his katanas were no longer digging into his back, but he didn’t try to close the space between them.

Oh fuck. Peter was here. Peter was _looking_ at him.

{Say something.} Yellow hissed urgently.

“Um… How, uh, how’ve you been?” He winced as the words left his mouth, weak and uncertain. He knew immediately from the sinking in his stomach and the tightening of Spidey’s fists that he had said the wrong fucking thing. Again.

There was hardly a moment to see it coming, but Wade wasn’t surprised when Spidey lunged for him, a small but iron-hard fist connecting with his jaw. Wade’s head whipped to the side and he stumbled back against the shed from the force of the blow. He felt his cheek bone crunch and collapse beneath Peter’s fist.

He gritted his teeth around a grunt and kept silent, watching from his periphery as Spidey shot a web in the other direction and swung away, disappearing into the inky night as if he had never been there in the first place.

“Yeah… I deserve that.” He muttered, reaching up to prod gingerly at the throbbing dent in his face. 

[How’ve you _been_?] White repeated scathingly.

Wade groaned.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

It took him two days to find Peter again. He could have gone to the Parkers’ apartment and followed him from there, or just knocked on the door like a normal person, but even he knew how inappropriate that would be when it was very clear that the boy didn’t want to see him. He had every right to avoid Wade if that’s what he wanted to do.

When he did find him, Spidey was lingering a few blocks from their old rendezvous point, crawling the walls and mumbling quietly to himself.

If Wade hadn’t been beating himself up (literally and figuratively) for the last forty-nine hours and drowning in guilt and nervous despair upon seeing more evidence of Peter’s fractured mental state, he might have noticed the absence of criminal activity in the area, or the way Spidey went very still when Deadpool lingered silently at the top of a nearby fire escape.

“I know you’re there.” His raised voice echoed down the alley and brought goosebumps to Wade’s skin (or would have, if he wasn’t scarred to hell and unable to develop more than a tingly chill). It was Peter’s voice. Peter was _talking_ to him.

Too many moments passed by in silence before Wade cleared his throat, his fingers twitching anxiously for his gun, just to have something to fiddle with.

{Petey hates guns.}

“I know.” He breathed, then raised his voice a little. “Right, your… Spidey sense.”

Peter mumbled something that sounded like, “I wish.” 

Wade stared, transfixed by the shadowy hero who crouched on the wall, fingers braced against the brick between his feet. Having Peter so close to him, just yards away after _so long_ , was wreaking havoc on his mind and his body. Want mixed with guilt and molten possessive need swept over confusion and concern. 

He remembered with a jolt that he had come here with a plan. After the utter disaster that was their last meeting, the boxes hadn’t let up about how badly he’d fucked everything over. Determined to get it right the second time, if he was lucky enough to even get a second time, he’d painstakingly written out an apology. It was shit, and he threw it away and shot himself eight times for his inadequacy, but that didn’t change the fact that an apology was required. He hurried to speak before Spidey could run away again.

“Look, uh, I have to… To say something.” He stepped carefully down the rusted iron stairs, descending until he was on the same level as Spidey, only to have Peter shift to the balls of his feet and creep, all liquid movement and subtle intimidation, up the wall until he was above Deadpool, looking down on him from a position of superiority.

[He’ll always be above you.] White whispered scornfully.

Wade swept his tongue across his chapped bottom lip and plowed onwards. “I should’ve started with this, really, but I was an idiot. What’s new, huh?” He chuckled nervously, but received no response. “Sorry. Um... Ah, shit. I stepped on my own line there. Fuck, look.” He took a deep, shuddering breath and braced both his hands on the flimsy metal railing just to have something beneath his fingers so he didn’t claw his own skin off in mortification. “I’m really, really fuckin’ sorry. I’m the biggest asshole in the whole universe, taking off like that I… I didn’t know that… I didn’t know about…”

Spidey moved then, reaching out to the platform above Wade’s head and swinging down so his feet landed softly on the railing beside the mercenary. He stood there in perfect balance, and Wade had to tilt his head back to look at him, breath caught in his throat and words choked off completely at the sudden shift in proximity.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Peter’s tone was cold and sharp, and Wade felt himself flinch.

“I…” He wasn’t sure how to answer that question, but his near certainty that he would get it wrong was a clammy paralysis racing down his limbs. “Um… I came back?”

“Why?” The word was rough, but Wade caught the subtle tremor in Peter’s hands before they curled into fists. “What could you possibly fucking want? Because it’s certainly not me.” Bitterness seeped like poison into his voice, and Wade would have to be deaf to miss the glint of wintery betrayal behind the words.

{He thinks we don’t _want_ him? Fucking _hell_ no. He must really be batshit out of his mind to believe that!}

Horror settled like a rock in Wade’s stomach. “Oh no… No no no, Baby Boy.” 

Peter twitched at the pet name, and Wade’s hand reached unconsciously for one of his, but he aborted the movement with a sharp jolt. He struggled for some way to make Peter understand that he couldn’t stop wanting him if he tried. And he had tried. For a whole month he tried and it had done nothing to diminish his all-consuming need for the boy who swung into his life and walked all over it, leaving his footprints everywhere.

He reached for someone else’s words, since his own never came out quite right. “You’re just like an angel.” He murmured, hoarse with desperation.

{Your skin makes me cry.}

“You float like a feather, in a beautiful world.” 

{And I wish I was special.}

“You’re so fuckin’ special.”

[But I’m a creep. I’m a weirdo.]

{What the hell am I doing here?}

[I don’t belong here.]

Spidey was shaking his head, the edges of a grimace barely visible beneath his black webbed mask. “I’m not.” He denied flatly, crossing his arms over his chest.

“You are.” Wade insisted, fighting against his muscles again as his arms trembled with the urge to reach out, just a couple of feet away, and pull the boy to him.

“No.” He protested, louder, a ragged edge making the words sound harsh. “I’m awful. You don’t fucking know.”

Wade stared at him in shock. “You’re not awful. You’re the farthest thing from awful. You’re… You’re perfect.”

{The most perfectest beautiful little spider in the whole goddamn universe.}

Peter jumped down from his perch, weight hardly rattling the rickety structure of the fire escape as he crowded into Wade’s space, the lines of his body hard with the promise of danger even though he stood a head shorter than Deadpool. “Stop. Fucking. Saying that.” 

His dark growl sent a ribbon of shameful arousal through Wade’s body. He turned to face the hero and spread his hands helplessly at his sides. “But it’s true.”

Spidey looked like he wanted to hit him, and Wade would have gladly taken more broken bones. He deserved them.

“Then why did you leave?” The question cut like ice. Like a really sharp blade of ice stabbed right through Wade’s heart. It left him breathless with terror and regret.

[See? He hates us.]

“I… I couldn’t…” He couldn’t deal with the betrayal of knowing his hero, the boy he had fallen so fucking in love with he could hardly breathe when they were together, had been seeing someone else. _Been with_ someone else. 

{But he’s dead now! Hip fucking hurray.}

And maybe… Maybe Peter wasn’t really perfect after all. But he was still _Peter_. 

Wade swallowed around his pounding heart. “I was upset. I didn’t know… I didn’t know that Harry –”

“Don’t.” The word lashed out, low and dangerous, and Wade froze at the unexpected threat that set his teeth on edge. “What does it fucking matter?” Peter hissed, inching even closer until Wade’s head was bent, chin brushing his collar as he looked into Spidey’s dark eye patches. There was hardly an inch between them, and Wade trembled as Peter craned his neck up, their mask-covered mouths tauntingly hovering, so very close.

“You weren’t here.” Peter stated in a slow, detached sort of voice. 

“You. Left.” 

In the next moment he was gone, leaving nothing but a brush of cool air as he somersaulted off the fire escape and shot a web, swinging around the corner and out of sight before Wade could catch his breath.

Wade let himself sink down onto the iron-grated platform, each shallow inhale tugging at the ragged edges of the hole that had been punched through his chest. His whole body ached with wretched guilt and he felt sick. He felt horrible.

[I tried to tell you.] White muttered over the stifled sob that was tearing up the inside of his throat. [Being with him, it’s just going to hurt.]

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Wade started following Spidey around. He was fully prepared to spend hours on end searching the city for the elusive spider every night, but it didn’t prove necessary. He always found Peter lingering in the same few-block radius near Midtown after dark fell, and followed him from there.

He didn’t bother trying to hide his persistent presence. He could have gone full stealth mode and stalked Peter like the good old days, but it wouldn’t have done any good. He needed Peter to know that he cared. 

[That you’re pitiful, obsessed, and desperate for his attention.]

{Desperate for his _sexual_ attention…}

He needed Peter to know that he wasn’t going to fuck off just because Spidey wasn’t letting him back in. He’d done the one thing he promised he wouldn’t and abandoned Peter when he needed him most. He had no idea of the pain he must have gone through when Harry offed himself, and he wanted to stab himself in the dick when he thought about how he might have been able to make it better, if only he’d been here.

[Hey, now. I think we know a little bit more about pain than angsty teen protagonist over here. He can suck it up; we’ve been through _much_ worse.]

{Shut up and shove it up your ass, Whitey. This is all your fucking fault anyway.}

[Yeah, like you really would’ve wanted to stick around and comfort Peter while he mourned his other lover? I don’t fucking think so.]

Wade didn’t know what Peter had been through in the past month, but the effects of it were etched all over Spider-Man. He watched with a keen eye as the hero beat the city’s criminals into submission, no longer pulling his punches like he used to. He didn’t seem to care about broken bones or concussions. Wade was sure on at least three occasions that someone was left with internal bleeding, but Spidey treated it all with chilling disaffection. He disposed of the lawbreakers with clinical precision, made all the more vicious for the rage that clearly simmered beneath the black stretch of his suit.

And it wasn’t just the increase in violence that marked a change in the hero. He didn’t talk as much. When he did banter at the criminals, it was crueler, harsher, with little humor to lighten the stormy tone of his vigilantism. And he was… More graceful, somehow. He’d always moved with amazing agility and elegant coordination, but now there was something fluid about his movements. The way he swung through the air, the way he fought, even crawling up walls and walking, it had taken on an almost predatory seamlessness. It was… Unsettling.

{Um, I think you mean _hot as fucking hell_.}

That, too. But the changes weren’t something that Wade could appreciate without shooting himself in the head for being a disgusting, selfish monster. How could he _appreciate_ the corruption of such sweet innocence? The shattering apart of the kind, good, veracious boy he’d fallen in love with? No, these changes settled like lead in Wade’s limbs, weighing him down with the knowledge that he had done this. He and Harry fucking Osborn (for whom his hatred still burned like a white-hot flare in the darkness of his present circumstances). 

Mostly he just trailed behind and watched. After one of the first fights, when Wade tried to step in to help against a few gang members trading shots in the warehouse district, he kept his distance. He’d hardly had the chance to swing his katanas, knocking a rifle to the ground and sending three of the delinquents stumbling back, before a swift, _hard_ kick to the chest had sent him slamming into a nearby truck. The force of Spidey’s blow had broken his sternum and cracked three ribs, but it was the impact to the back of his head (leaving a dent in the surface of the truck) that had left him momentarily stunned.

Peter had made it very clear that they were no longer badass crime-fighting partners. Just... One dangerous spider kicking ass and a pent-up, manic-depressive mercenary following him around like a kicked dog.

And they didn’t speak much, either. Whenever Wade would try to start a conversation, or just make some tasteless joke to break the heavy tense howthefuckdidwegetthisfuckedupIwanttodie silence between them, Peter would respond with a short, biting remark that always had Wade falling back several yards, his heart a mangled lump of malfunctioning muscle sitting heavy in his hollowed-out chest.

But for all that, Peter never made him leave.

He could have. As dejected as Wade was feeling, despite his penitent determination to make it up to Peter somehow, if Spidey had demanded that he leave, really made it clear that he wanted nothing to do with Wade, he would have backed off. He’d never been one to force himself on people who didn’t want him around, and just the thought that he was making things worse for Peter by sticking around made him constantly sick with anxiety. So if he was told, unequivocally, to leave, then he would. 

But Peter never said the words. He made all sorts of allusions to the assumption that Wade didn’t really want to be there, and hurtful slicing accusations regarding his absence, but he never told him to disappear.

It was a week before Wade worked up the courage to address Peter’s quiet, but quite regular mumbling to himself. It would have been one thing if he was just self-monologuing; lots of people talked to themselves. But he was clearly responding to something else, holding a conversation with a partner that no one else could see or hear. Wade, despite his extensive experience in the area, could not comprehend how Peter had been pushed to this breaking point. But he treated the issue as delicately as he could, terrified of scaring Spidey off by confronting him about it.

Peter had just webbed up a petty gas station robber, leaving him with a broken nose and fractured wrist, and Wade was following him up the side of a nearby building and listening to the quietly murmured conversation Spidey was having with himself. 

“Switch back to stealth webs.” He was crawling along the bricks, a yard to Wade’s right. “Yeah, tomorrow I can.” A few moments of familiar silence as they neared the roof’s ledge. “He won’t get more than a month with good behavior since he didn’t have a criminal record.”

Wade knew he must be talking about the kid they’d just left tied to the gas pump, waiting for the cops to come pick him up. 

“Do your voices tell you about them?” He asked cautiously as Spidey slinked onto the ledge and crouched there, looking across the fire escape to stare at Wade. “The criminals you detain. Do they… Or um, does the voice, if it’s just one, know things about them?” It was an important question to ask, since delusional hallucinations were of much greater concern than your regular old run of the mill head-friend. 

He held his breath as Spidey tipped his head ever so slightly to one side, looking through his blank mask as if he had absolutely no idea what Wade was talking about.

{Aw, come on… Don’t hold back on us Spidey-Baby! We wanna meet your voices, too.}

[You’re just smitten with the idea that he might be as insane as we are.]

{We could be Romeo and Juliet, the mental health editionTM. And we could wear the pretty dresses and stab ourself in the breast.}

“You think…” Peter spoke slowly, realization creeping into the tone of his words. “That I’m hearing voices?”

Dread sank into Wade’s stomach; it was so much worse than he thought if Peter wasn’t even aware of it. He swallowed hard, drifting to the edge of the steps and wrapping his fingers around the iron rung that separated them. “You’ve been talking to yourself.” He said it gently, trying for as calm and nonjudgmental as he could manage.

The harsh bark of laughter almost made Wade jump.

“No, idiot. I’m talking to the Stark tech in my ear.” Wade stared in confusion, even as relief flooded his veins like sweet honey, smoothing over the ragged edges of his worry. “There’s an AI in my suit. Her name’s Karen.”

“Oh.”

{Damn… There goes our dream of getting it on with a young Leonardo DiCaprio.}

Spidey snickered through his mask, leaning forward to peer into Wade’s eyepatches. “You really thought I’d lost my mind?” Wade licked his lips, feeling like a bit of an imbecile for believing it. After all, Peter had never been fragile enough to break like Wade had. “That my head was as fucked up as yours?”

[Ouch.]

Wade leaned back, left hand twitching towards his hip holster as he averted his gaze. “Glad to be wrong.” He muttered, voice low and rough.

There was a drawn-out moment of silence, more uncomfortable than most of the empty space between them had been.

“Why do you care?” Peter asked suddenly, words sharp.

His gaze was drawn back to the dark mask, familiar and unfamiliar all at once. “What?”

“Why. Do you. Care?” Peter repeated himself, scathing in his exaggeration. 

“Because… Because I care.” Wade shrugged helplessly. “I don’t want you to be… hurting.” That’s what it boiled down to, wasn’t it? He couldn’t stand the thought of Peter in pain. He couldn’t stand the sight of it. 

Spidey recoiled slightly, and Wade wished desperately that he could see the expression on his face. 

“You shouldn’t.” He stated after a moment, cold and unyielding.

“What?”

“You shouldn’t care.” There was a sneer in his voice, vindictive. “You obviously didn’t care enough to stick around in the first place. Why should you care now?”

[See. He hates you.]

Wade stared helplessly, struggling for words that wouldn’t come. After a moment, Peter waved a dismissive hand in his direction. “It was stupid of you to come back at all.”

He blinked against the stinging in his eyes, helplessness settling into the ache of his skin. “I thought I was a fool for no one.” He leaned forward, drawn by the magnetic need to close the distance between them. “Oh baby, I’m a fool for you.”

Spidey scoffed. “Did you just quote Muse at me?”

{I don’t care what you say. This is true love.}

Wade smiled weakly beneath stifling leather. “Rise up and take the power back; it’s time that the fat cats had a heart attack.”

He could almost see the eye roll beneath those charcoal lenses, and a forgotten warmth sparked to life in his bones. “You’re an idiot.”

“Never said I wasn’t.”

Peter straightened up. “Get lost, Deadpool.” 

The words might have been cold, but there was a subtle fondness to the shape of them that had Wade sighing wistfully as he watched the hero swing away, too fast for the mercenary to follow this time.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

It had been two weeks since Wade came back to New York, and he was having a Bad Day. None of his days had been particularly good lately, but this one was especially sucky. 

He hadn’t slept in weeks and it was catching up to him. He’d caught a few brief snatches of unconsciousness here and there (mostly when he couldn’t stand the monotonous misery of existence and turned to his old friend Dick for solace), but no solid hours had been clocked since… Well, since he could remember. 

White was pissy. Yellow was restless. Everyone was in a fucking mood and Wade was close to losing his shit. 

[You followed Peter to his school. His _high school_. You watched him go into classes that he’s still legally required to take. With books and backpacks and other children.]

{Ugh, I know… Isn’t it so American Beauty?}

“Ew. Please don’t compare me to a not bald Lex Luther.” Wade kept his glare fixed on the tools in his gloved hands, watching the steady scrape of tempered steel against whetstone as he lovingly sharpened his Fixation Bowie. 

[You knew Spider-Man was young, but you never saw that in action. You nearly fucked a high schooler, Wade. Not even an upperclassman. A kid.]

{I knooooow…} Yellow crooned longingly. {Isn’t it so fucking hot?}

Wade grimaced, but his movements never faltered. He tried to focus on the stretch and flex of his bicep muscles as he stroked the blade of his knife across the stone, over and over. 

[You’d still fuck him. In a heartbeat, wouldn’t you? Press his pretty young face into the ground and take him _hard_ from behind. Hold his wrists down, trap his thighs between yours, make sure he can’t wriggle away.]

{Oh gods yes yessssss. Tear that sexy black suit right off him, rip it apart with our teeth and tear his skin a little too see some of that sweet sweet red oh fuck he just slinks around in that skin-tight sex suit tempting us _tempting_ us and he’s just right there to take we could take we could have him under us have him gods we want him so fucking bad}

Wade bit down hard on his bottom lip as he flipped the knife in his hand and drove it down into his side, nicking his hip bone and getting blood all over the blade he just spent twenty minutes cleaning and sharpening. 

Yellow whimpered pitifully, but at least the boxes’ train of thought was interrupted. For however long that would last. He slid the knife out of its warm sheath and wiped it clean on his thigh, wary of getting caught in a compromising position if Spidey happened to swing by. He wasn’t usually out until ten or eleven, depending on the night, and it wasn’t like he would come looking for Wade, but it didn’t hurt to be safe rather than sorry. He didn’t want to put any more unnecessary stress on Peter’s mind by getting caught with a knife in his hip. Or thigh. Or hand. 

[Like he’d even care…]

{Valid point. Our little spider has been pretty frisky lately, hasn’t he? Like a little viper.}

[He’s been venomous, certainly.]

Wade heaved a sigh, tucking the whetstone back into his leg pouch and climbing laboriously to his feet. He relished the twinge of pain and discomfort as the knitting muscles in his side were jostled. “Well… Better get started tracking down our vicious viper.”

[A+ for alliteration.]

{Yeah, that’s right. We went to school.}

[Dropped out when we were Peter’s age.]

{Whatever.}

Wade tried to block them out, humming tunelessly under his breath as he took a running leap for the next rooftop. He made it, barely, landing with a tight roll. He wouldn’t have minded taking a tumble to the concrete below, except that it might have kept Spidey waiting. If he was even out yet. It was a little earlier than usual, but Wade hadn’t been able to fathom another fucking second rotting his brain with the blare of the evening news and no company but the bloodstains on his sunken armchair. 

He didn’t see any sign of his dark hero for almost an hour, leaving him to loiter around those seven blocks they always seemed to meet in, waiting. 

[He might not even show.]

{Itsy little toy, we’ll punish him if he misbehaves.} Yellow’s tone was darkened with anticipatory intent.

[Maybe he decided to give you a taste. Leave you out in the cold.]

{Figuratively. It’s very hot at the moment. What is this, like 80? 90? Fahrenheit? Maybe 100.}

[We’re hardly even sweating.]

Wade tried to keep a grip on his emotional whiplash, pushing it all to the periphery as he focused on his increasingly frustrating search.

In the end, he found Peter hanging out on the side of a bank, his suit blending in perfectly with the dark mirrored windows. He couldn’t help, or excuse, the deep sense of relief and satisfaction at proving the boxes’ fears unfounded.

[Guess he’s waiting for another day… Gonna set you up real good first. Get you nice and comfortable before ripping it all away.]

“He’s here tonight.” Wade muttered, choosing to focus on that fact.

{Good boy.} Yellow practically purred, and Wade gave his head a shake, trying to keep it together.

He settled down on the ledge across the street and threw one of his disposable daggers at the bank, cracking a window pane a few inches from Spidey’s head. The hero peered unhurriedly in his direction, only to turn and crawl off the other way, leaving Wade to follow as best he could.

[He really is being bratty.]

He finally caught up on the next block, jogging over to Peter where he stood on the edge of an office building with that slight tilt to his head that meant he was listening for crime.

“So what’s with the dark and angsty new suit, anyway? Your marketing team think you needed a makeover?” He couldn’t maintain the silence, desperate for something, _anything_ outside his head.

[Your escapism is just going to piss him off.]

Spidey’s glare was clear even through the mask.

[Everything you do seems to piss him off.]

“I _like_ it.” Peter snarled, hands curled into fists where they were planted on his hips. “I don’t give a fuck what anyone else thinks.”

{Me _ow_.}

“Yeah, good. That’s good. You shouldn’t. I certainly don’t.”

[Yes you do.]

Wade grunted in acknowledgment. “I was just wondering, you know. About the change. Not that I don’t like it, ‘cause I do. I totally do.”

{It’s hot.}

“It’s hot. Fuck, no, I just mean… You know, it’s whatever. You do you. I was just –”

“Making a little joke?” Peter sneered. “What, did you forget to take your meds this morning?”

He stared, the hot prickle of unexpected hurt and familiar shamed disgust making his fingers twitch.

[See what he really thinks of you?]

Wade cleared his throat. “Something like that.” He muttered.

The line of Spidey’s shoulders was tense and defensive, and he hunched in on himself slightly, the brush of an exhale audible through the thin fabric of his suit. “It’s the same one.” He mumbled, gaze askance as if he couldn’t stand to look at Wade while he spoke. “The fabric just changes. This is stealth mode.”

“Oh.” Wade was still familiar enough with Peter and his body language to recognize an apology, even a silent one. “That’s, uh… Cool.”

Peter shrugged half-heartedly, and turned without a word to shoot a web, swinging East at a relaxed pace, efficient but still slow enough for Wade to keep up from the rooftops.

The mercenary took off after him, falling into the routine they had patched together with scotch tape and dashed dreams these last couple of weeks. It didn’t take long for him to arrive at the crime scene, just a few scant seconds behind Spider-Man. He dropped down the last few floors, not bothered by his sprained ankles and fractured tibias as he stood by and watched the fight, one hand lingering on the grip of his Sig in case it was needed.

It looked like a mugging gone wrong, the victim bleeding from his arm as he fled the alley, expensive watch glinting in the light of the streetlamp as he turned the corner. Spidey was soundly taking care of the three perpetrators,

[Beating them to a bloody pulp.]

{Mmmmm…}

and it took Wade a good long few seconds before he realized that he recognized one of them.

“Hey!” He stepped towards the fray, brow furrowing. “I know you.” It was one of the boys from Sister Margaret’s.

[What’s he doing getting involved with petty theft?]

{We could steal if we wanted.}

Granted, Wade hadn’t been to the bar in a while, but it was still unusual to catch one of the established mercs tied up in crime as small-time as this. 

“Yeah, you. Muscles. Let’s chat.” He strode up to the man, already slumped against the dumpster breathing hard from the pummeling Spidey was doling out, and reached for the front of his jacket.

A swift kick knocked his arm aside and an unforgiving fist to the nose sent him stumbling back. Spidey was quick to follow up, shoving Wade hard against the wall and pinning him there.

{Oooooh fuck me…}

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Peter growled, low and furious.

Heat sank into Wade’s core, a curling, treacherous thing. All he smelled was blood.

“What the hell?” He spat, words congested as he strained against Spidey’s hold to raise one hand to his clearly broken (though already healing) face.

Peter jostled him, rough, and Wade bit back a moan.

{Oh shit fuck he could take us he could turn us and take us and fuck fuck fuck}

“I don’t want you interfering.” Spidey commanded, and Wade tried to ignore the tight, hard line of Peter’s body pressed so close to his.

“Interfering?” He repeated, disbelief and irritation bleeding through. “Do you even care that the shithead is getting away right now?”

Peter didn’t even turn to look. “You’ll just fuck things up. You always fuck things up.” 

“Gee, thanks.” Wade drawled, bitter sarcasm dripping off his words. “So glad I’m around to help. Oh, excuse me, I guess I mean _fuck things up_.”

Peter growled in furious frustration, his fingers digging painful divots into Wade’s biceps. “Why _are_ you here?” The words tore through the air, leaving the space between them tense and hot and angry. “Why don’t you just fuck off already? We’re just gonna… This is just… You’re so fucking reckless, aren’t you?”

Wade bared his teeth. “I tell my love to wreck it all. Cut out all the ropes and let me fall.”

Peter scoffed, a bitter, hollow sound. “Love? You? What a fucking _joke_.”

“Yeah. _I’m_ the joke.” He snarled. “Fucking some other guy behind your back. Oh no, wait! That was –” 

Spidey’s fist broke his nose again with a satisfying crunch, the back of Wade’s head bouncing off the bricks.

He tore his mask off, brown eyes _burning_ as he glared at Wade. And he was breathing hard, his white teeth flashing sharp between soft dry lips and his cheeks were flushed with rage, his hair a tangled sweaty mess sticking to his forehead and Wade was going to shatter the fuck apart he was so full of, of some uncontrollable aching painful need and anger and so much fucking emotion he couldn’t even feel it, couldn’t do anything but growl, a feral sound ripped from his chest, pressure leaking past his tight-locked jaw.

“Fuck you.” Peter spat. 

“That’s right. Fuck –”

Peter shoved aside his mask and kissed him.

It was harsh and hard and violent. Rougher than any kiss they’d ever shared. Brutal in its sharpness, all teeth and tongue and the keen iron flash of blood blooming under hungry incisors. 

Peter whined, a desperate angry sound, and Wade’s answering groan set the air vibrating with fervent urgency. He forced Peter’s jaw apart with his own and shoved his tongue between slick teeth to taste him finally taste him. And it wasn’t enough. He was _starving_ for it. 

The moment he moved to grab him, one arm curling tight around Peter’s slim waist and a hand reaching up to tangle in that chestnut fresh-fucked hair, Peter twisted away.

He shoved himself off Wade’s chest with a wounded sound and flashed into the air in an instant, fleeing.

Wade slumped against the wall, breathless and dizzy and dazed and – 

Hopeful.

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Song Credits:

Chapter Title:  
Take Me Home – Perfume Genius  
Lyrics:  
Creep – Radiohead  
Supermassive Black Hole – Muse  
Uprising – Muse  
Skinny Love – Bon Iver

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************


	4. When It's Cold I'd Like to Die

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One year ago today, the first chapter of _I Think I Might've Inhaled You_ was published.
> 
> Happy Anniversary.
> 
> I can't believe how wild this ride has been, and I want to thank each and every reader from the bottom of my heart; you are all fucking amazing.
> 
> Check out this FANTASTIC artwork by A44 depicting the kiss at the end of the last chapter (see end notes for more details):
> 
>  

**Peter**

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

_I don’t want to swim the ocean. I don’t want to fight the tide._  
_I don’t want to swim forever. When it’s cold I’d like to die._

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

It was a warm night, though not so hot that Peter’s hair was stuck to his forehead with sweat. Just warm enough that he was thankful for the soft, fickle breeze that pushed air across the breathable surface of his suit. The city was almost still, as if everyone in New York had decided to take the night off and stay in, and there were more stars in the sky than usual.

By all accounts it was a lovely evening, but Peter couldn’t fully enjoy it with the twist of anticipatory anxiety making his gut clench and his heart beat fast. 

He was crouched on the edge of the building, ready to tip forward over the ledge and swing off towards whatever crime needed his attention. But he couldn’t go yet, even though his muscles ached to be moving, to be _running_.

He was waiting for someone. 

The gentlest prickling at the back of his neck had his breath catching in his throat; not exactly danger, more like… A caress. 

Aware of the presence that loomed behind him, Peter slowly straightened from his crouch, fingers twitching at his sides as his muscles uncoiled. He stared out over the hazy city lights, dim and ethereal under the cloudy sky, and delayed the inevitable for just a few moments longer. Just as slowly, with nothing more than a shallow breath of air to sustain him, he turned.

He stood a few yards away, outlined by the weak, watery moonlight. He was stationed like a statue in his suit, but he wore no mask, and the sight of his bare face made Peter’s whole chest ache fiercely. And at the just-visible glint of blue in his eyes, all the breath was stolen from Peter’s lungs. He moved then, raising his arms out at his sides, an open invitation.

“Peter.” He breathed, voice like silk on the night air. And he was so _beautiful_ it made Peter feel faint. “Come here.”

Peter fell forward with a sob, stumbling towards his open arms like a drowning man grasping for land.

“Harry.”

Cotton soft arms enveloped him, so much more forgiving than Kevlar and hard plastic, and he folded into Harry’s body like he needed to belong there. He was cold through his sweatpants and long-sleeved shirt, his embrace like ice, but Peter didn’t care. 

“Harry, you’re here.” He cried into the older boy’s shoulder, bones sharp through skin and shirt, and clutched helplessly at him.

“I missed you, Petey.” He murmured into Peter’s hair, the Spider-Man mask no longer a barrier between them. “Where’ve you been?”

He pulled back to look at Harry through tear-blurred eyes, relief like open floodgates in his chest. “I’ve been… I’ve been here.” He glanced around the rooftop in a haze. “I’ve been here, looking for you.”

“You have?” Harry looked surprised, his perfect eyebrows drawing together in a perplexed line, pale lips parting like an open question mark. 

“Of course.” Peter gushed, running his hands down Harry’s chest and pressing himself close, searching for assurance that he was here and solid and real. “All I’ve wanted is to find you.”

Harry blinked at him. “Then why are you dropping me?”

He froze, and stared, the blood draining rapidly from his face as a deep horrible aching _wrong_ sank into his gut and flowed out through his veins.

“What?” His voice was barely a croak of sound, all strength fled from his vocal chords in the face of his terror.

Blue eyes never waivered, thin lips still parted in a question. “Why are you dropping me?”

The roof disappeared and Harry was falling.

He was falling and Peter had to catch him. He had to. But he couldn’t use his webs, so he dove after him. They fell together and he tried to get close to Harry, he tried to grab him, but no matter how hard he pushed the air was like snow, cold and sharp and thick, and he was always just out of reach. 

Panic blurred his vision and the ringing of his pulse drowned out all other sound. In the last moment, he surged closer and seized Harry around the waist. He caught him.

He caught him and he landed, choking on his fear. 

The muffled crack was like thunder in the silence, and Peter shook as Harry broke in his arms.

His head fell too far back, exposing the bruised column of his throat above the green Kevlar of the suit. He bent the wrong way, an inverted V with its fulcrum just above Harry’s pelvis. 

He looked up as Peter began to sob, face impassive and beautiful, even with the dark trickle of blood trailing down from the corner of his mouth. 

“I love you.” He said. 

“No.” Peter cried, falling to his knees on the cold, wet pavement. It was raining. 

“I love you even though you’re killing me.”

“ _No_.” Peter sobbed through the word, clutching desperately at Harry’s body, trying to keep him together, but it was useless. He was falling apart. 

“No, don’t leave. Don’t leave me!” He couldn’t get a breath in past the fierce stab of panic constricting his chest. Pieces of Harry tumbled from his arms, landing on the pavement fifty stories below with sickening thumps, until Peter’s hands were covered in blood and all that was left of him was his head.

He stared up with blank, hopeless eyes, and parted his blood-tinged lips.

“Was it always you?”

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Peter lurched into consciousness with a violent gasp, everything sharp and bright and disorienting. His heart was racing, skin tingling with the urgent demand of danger. His cheeks were wet and he couldn’t breathe around the half-sob caught in his throat and the world was upside down.

The world was upside down. He was on the ceiling again, the anxious grip of bare fingers and toes holding him up in the corner of his room; the darkest one, farthest from the window and the door. 

He’d started waking up here a few weeks ago and now it happened almost every time he managed to catch a few hours of unconsciousness. He wanted to check the time to see how long he had slept this time, but it took him a while to remember how to breathe. Once he had forced his achingdyingIcan’tstandthis panic back into the pit of his stomach, holding his breath and listening to the world outside his window until flashes of his nightmare faded to the back of his mind, he carefully detached himself from the walls and dropped silently to the middle of his floor.

His alarm clock read 6:52 AM; he’d been asleep for just under two hours. The traffic outside was thickening, but the apartment was silent. Aunt May must have just left. A lucky break. He straightened up with a short breath, tired aching muscles already crawling with restlessness.

He couldn’t stay here.

He grabbed his backpack off the messy desk, yanked his suit out of his tangled bed covers and shoved it in before zipping the bag closed. He threw on a pair of socks and his ratty converse to go with his three-day-old shorts and t-shirt, not bothering to give a fuck about his hair. He slammed his bedroom door behind him just to break the silence, flipped his skateboard into hand by the door, and was bounding down the apartment’s cinderblock stairwell in under a minute.

He took his suit everywhere with him. If it wasn’t eighty degrees outside he’d be wearing it under his clothes, but pants and long-sleeves would draw too much attention in this heat. He wished he could slip into his preferred persona as easily as slipping into a dark corner and shedding his clothes, but it wasn’t that simple. 

No. He had to slip into a dark corner, get _naked_ , and then shimmy into the suit and hope he wasn’t inadvertently flashing anyone. It was a fucking hassle, but it was worth it to spend his days as Spider-Man. He couldn’t leave his apartment building suited up in broad daylight, and he didn’t go around swinging through public spaces either. He kept to the shadows, which is where most of the crime occurred during the daytime anyway. 

He would spend every minute as Spidey if he could, because it was the only time he ever felt even remotely in control of himself, but it just wasn’t feasible. If he wasn’t pretending to be asleep when Aunt May left for work in the mornings, she would make him walk with her to the bus stop. And sometimes she’d call during the day to check on him and he’d usually say he was just watching TV, so he had to be home periodically or make sure that the neighbors saw him fucking around on his skateboard outside.

And there honestly was just _less crime_ during the day, so he spent a lot of his time trying out all of the suits capabilities. And doing that required space where no wandering eyes or prying news helicopters might catch a glimpse, so he was fairly occupied with searching out all the best spots on the outskirts of towns. Shipping yards and abandoned warehouses worked best, but even those received unexpected guests from time to time.

Peter was fairly sure that an old homeless man had once walked in on him making a giant penis-shaped sculpture out of webs while hanging upside down from a support beam. (He was dying to try out the ‘hardening’ webs, okay? It didn’t turn out as cool as he’d hoped.)

Sometimes he’d just wander the streets of New York keeping an ear out for crime. It was actually easier to get around in his civies when the sun shone down from an obnoxiously blue sky, and people could walk through the city for hours without being noticed. Just blending in with the crowd, moving one foot in front of the other and _not thinking_.

So his days were filled with endless monotony and covert vigilantism. And his nights…

His nights were filled with Wade.

Wade fucking Wilson.

Wade Dissapears-for-a- _Month_ -and-Doesn’t-Call-or-Text. 

Wade Drives-You-Fucking-Insane-Until-All-You-Want-to-Do-Is-Punch-His-Face-and-Bite-His-Stupid-Mouth.

Wade I’ll-Pretend-to-be-Sorry-and-Follow-You-Around-Like-a-Pathetic-Kicked-Dog-But-Really-I’m-Just-Going-to-Tear-Your-Heart-Out-Of-Your-Chest-and-Crush-it-Between-My-Teeth-and-Leave-Your-Mangled-Body-Lying-in-the-Fucking-Dust-But-Still-Aching-For-Me-Like-I-Stole-Everything-Inside-of-You-and-Swallowed-it-Down.

He hated it. He hated how much he _wanted_ him. He hated how the very minute Wade walked back into his life like the whole world wasn’t different now, offering nothing more than a casual ‘how’ve you been?’ Peter needed him. His whole body oriented itself to Wade _fucking_ Wilson, raw with the visceral desire to be held by him.

Because there was a time that Peter thought Wade would make everything okay. That as long as they were together, Wade would take care of him. Somehow, in some magical, stupidly naïve way, he’d believed Wade could solve everything.

And he fucking _hated_ the primitive, ignorant parts at the core of his body that still longed for that. Because he knew better now. He knew that Wade wouldn’t stick around. He wouldn’t make everything okay again. He wouldn’t keep his promises. 

If he let the mercenary back in, if he let himself need again, he was just going to end up broken and abandoned and even worse off than he was now, if that was possible.

Three nights ago he’d made a mistake. He’d let his anger (and he was so _fucking_ angry all the time, but Wade could really make him spit) get the best of him. He’d let Wade under his skin. It was a moment of weakness that left him in tears, screaming his frustrations out on a rooftop in Queens, hating Wade and hating himself and hating the world for being so fucked up.

Why? Why had Wade come back? Why now? He was making everything harder with his stupid apologies and his stupid mouth and his stupid fucking body in that leather suit and not saying a goddamn word about where he had been all this time. Peter didn’t need that. Not right now, and not ever. To prove it to himself, he didn’t wait around to meet Wade the next night. He didn’t even stay in Midtown. He fucked around in Brooklyn and put at least three guys in the hospital. 

And Wade didn’t come.

He didn’t wait around last night, either. He thought maybe Wade would finally get the message and fuck off for good this time (and he ignored the way that thought made his breath come short and fast and his extremities shaky and numb like he’d been out in the cold for too long). But Wade found him in Harlem around one in the morning. 

He followed Peter around, the game of cat and mouse a familiar pattern by now, but he didn’t speak. He kept his distance, and he kept his mouth shut. Sure, Peter heard him muttering to the boxes every now and then, a disjointed third of a conversation not meant for his spider ears, but he didn’t speak to Peter.

Peter wasn’t sure whether he was relieved or disappointed.

So he settled for not thinking about it, which is what he had been doing since he crawled into his bedroom window a little after four last night. 

And it was going well so far. The city was alive and kicking at half-past seven and one scrawny kid on a skateboard went absolutely unnoticed. He listened to the world. He heard drivers shouting and kids crying, cars rumbling and dogs barking. He listened for a few moments to the alcoholics anonymous meeting in the basement of a church he passed, and to a couple arguing heatedly about kitchen appliances in a nearby apartment. He heard all sorts of things, and it kept him distracted. Marginally.

He didn’t hear any crime that morning, so he kicked around gritting his teeth and wasting time. He went home for lunch, which consisted of half of a banana because the daytime talk show he had droning in the background mentioned something about the new leadership at Oscorp and he lost his appetite after that. He was there when Aunt May called to check in, and gone again as soon as he hung up.

It was hot, but he still itched to get into his suit. Being covered up wasn’t all that bad when the material was breathable and cool against his skin, probably laced with some sort of lightweight metal alloy that allowed it to deflect most knives. And he liked being able to talk to Karen.

Not that he, you know, _talked_ to her like, talked about his feelings or anything. It was just nice to open his mouth and say words and have someone listening and responding. Even if that someone was just a computer who thought you wanted suggestions for places nearby that served American food when you made some stupid joke about being “hungry for justice.”

He hadn’t talked to Ned or MJ since the funeral. They’d tried to contact him, but he ignored their calls and deleted their texts. He just couldn’t deal with them right now. They were living in a different world, and he didn’t have the patience to pretend like he was happy to be around them when they didn’t understand anything.

But Karen kept him company. And she was a quick learner. After the first few times that Peter expressed his eternal disinterest in the injuries he inflicted on criminals, she stopped listing them out loud. She would still mention it if anyone sustained a life-threatening blow, and Peter would back off. Because he didn’t want the police on his back on top of everything else. She looked things up for him, played music when he asked for it, and best of all, she didn’t talk about Wade.

Other than identifying him as “Deadpool, a dangerous and psychologically compromised mercenary,” the first time he showed up those miserable two weeks ago, she hadn’t said a single word. And her clinical response to him showed Peter that she must not have access to any of the previous footage from his suit, because she didn’t know that they were already acquainted. She hadn’t been watching those last few months play out.

It was a relief. To have one person, just one, who didn’t know how fucked up his life was.

He slipped into his suit in the alley beside a string of department stores that afternoon. He beat up a drug dealer and threw someone out of a stolen car, and he was home for dinner just a half hour later than he said he’d be. He pretended to ignore Aunt May’s red-rimmed eyes when she asked where he’d been and he mumbled something about skateboarding under his breath.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Wade found him more quickly that night. 

Peter assumed that meant Wade had waited somewhere nearby his apartment and followed him from Queens, and he wasn’t quite sure how he felt about that. He should have been able to sense it. He was always so aware of Wade whenever he knew the mercenary was close, but some fatal flaw in his spidey sense just… Didn’t react to him anymore. 

It was infuriating. He should know when someone was watching him, following him, get the familiar prickle at the back of his neck that always told him if he was being focused on. And sure, he’d probably get a nice jolt if Deadpool swung one of those razor-sharp katanas at him, but otherwise it was radio silence. Wade wasn’t triggering his alarm systems and that just… That was just fucked up. Because he was more dangerous than anyone else in the world to Peter.

Wade kept his distance, as he had the night before, but he didn’t hide himself. The occasional flash of red a half block down from Peter, leaping between rooftops or jumping down fire escapes, allowed him to keep tabs on the mercenary. And if he adjusted his pace accordingly, well… It was only so he wouldn’t lose track of the idiot and be unpleasantly surprised by him when he eventually popped up again.

About a half hour into his patrol, when he’d caught wind of an altercation at a gas station three quarters of a mile east and began to head that way, he felt a prickle of unease run down his spine. It was subtle, not the demanding shock of danger, just… A nudge of warning. Like an unknown presence had turned its eyes on him.

“Karen.” He spoke softly as he swung to a stop on the side of an office building and resisted the urge to look around. “Is there someone following me?”

“Yes, Peter.” She answered promptly. “The mercenary known as Deadpool is point one eight miles southwest of you. He has been trailing you since Harvey Road, approximately twenty-four minutes ago.”

A little red arrow pointed in his direction on Peter’s field of vision, and he rolled his eyes. “No. I meant anyone else.”

There was a short pause. “I have not detected any other repeating identities in your visual data stream, nor does accessing the city’s street-level cameras or the Stark satellite feeds indicate a tail of any kind.”

Peter hummed absently at that, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end as he physically restrained himself from peering back towards the cluster of billboards they had just passed. He caught a glimpse of Wade from the corner of his eye as he started down the street again, but continued to ignore him as he made his way towards the assault still playing at the edge of his hearing.

The light tingle of warning didn’t let up, but he pushed it to the back of his mind as he dealt with what appeared to be a gang altercation at the Shell gas station. Wade stood back, as Peter had trained him to do (because the prospect of being a team again just… just… made him sick), and the wannabe gangsters were soon webbed, groaning or unconscious, to the nearest gas pumps. 

The low buzz of awareness didn’t leave his skin even when he was a few blocks down the road, swinging aimlessly through the city until the next crime called for his attention. There was something electric in the air, like a gathering storm, and it set him on edge. Pressing his lips together in concentration, Peter shot his next web early and took a sharp turn into the service alley behind a string of restaurants. 

“Switch to web nets.” He breathed into his mask as he clung to the bricks and began to climb towards the roof. 

“Yes, Peter.”

He let himself get a couple more stories off the ground before he extended one wrist and, without looking or letting himself hesitate, shot a web on instinct. There was no sound but a very soft thump and, when Peter concentrated hard, the near-silent, even pattern of breathing. Not sure what he was dealing with, he dropped quickly to the pavement and darted towards the place he’d shot his web. 

There, tucked into the shadows beside a parked truck and nearly invisible against the dark of the building, was a woman.

She wore black clothes covering her whole body, leaving nothing bare but her face and the tips of her fingers, and a utility belt that was uncannily similar to Deapdool’s, though it was also black. Her auburn hair was pulled into a tight ponytail and she was smoothly and efficiently slicing her way out of the web net with a nasty looking knife. 

“I’m impressed.” She stated, voice cool and unconcerned with just a hint of huskiness to give her words any texture at all. “I can count on one hand the number of people who could make me if I tailed them.” 

Peter frowned, keeping his fingers on his web shooters in case she made any sudden movements when she finished cutting herself free of where she’d been pinned to the wall. 

“Who the fuck are you?”

Her ice blue eyes flickered up to meet his gaze as she bent down to free her legs in two smooth swipes of the knife. Her blank expression betrayed nothing at all.

“A friend.” Was all she said, easily shaking off the remaining synthetic web silk and taking a step forward. 

Peter tensed, ready to web her to the wall all over again, but she didn’t move further than to slide her knife into a thigh holster with a clean, clear scrape of metal on leather.

“Not of mine.” He stated, voice low with warning. He had a quip about birthday party invites on the tip of his tongue, but something about this woman’s demeanor unnerved him, and he held it in.

She gave the smallest quirk of her lips in response, as if to show recognition of the comment, though he couldn’t read whether she actually found it amusing or not. “Of Tony’s, then. A… Mutual friend, as it were.”

He scowled, hands tightening into fists at the mention of Tony fucking Stark. “He sent you to follow me?” He demanded, disbelief and anger churning in his stomach.

“Yes.” She replied, completely unabashed. “He expressed concern over your current state of mind, and requested that I keep an eye on you.”

The fucking _gall_ of that man made him want to spit. 

“I don’t need a babysitter.” He growled out, resisting the urge to shove her up against the wall (which he thought might not prove his point very well). 

She stared at him for a moment too long, making it feel like her emotionless eyes were cutting right through him, ruthlessly unveiling every part of himself that he tried so desperately to hide. “Looks like you already have one.” She pointed out calmly, gaze flickering up behind Peter.

He turned just enough to see Wade making his way down the closest fire escape, silent and intent, his movements purposeful enough to made something lurch in Peter’s stomach. He ignored the feeling, turning back to his tail with a sneer beneath his mask. “You should get your eyes checked. That’s not a babysitter, that’s a stalker.”

That steady gaze was leveled at him again, and he had to reassure himself that he was, in fact, wearing a mask so she couldn’t see his expression. Then easily, telegraphing her intention, she lifted a hand to the pistol sitting low on her hip. “You need that taken care of?”

Something inside Peter snapped, harsh and vindictive, and he flashed forward, pinning her up against the bricks with a hand to her collar. “What part of ‘I don’t need a babysitter’ do you not understand?” His words cut sharp and vicious, and he felt the restless burn in his chest.

A short, shallow flash of emotion finally cracked the placid mask of the woman’s face, and her stare turned menacing.

A hand landed on Peter’s shoulder, and his whole body flushed with the weight of it, warm through leather and spandex.

“Natasha.” Wade greeted at his shoulder, voice clipped. 

Peter jerked at the rumbled word, spoken over the top of his head, and he let his hand fall away as realization washed over him.

“Wilson.” The Black Widow stated coldly, her body relaxing back against the wall as if she had always meant to stand there and lean against it. Her hand remained firmly on the grip of her pistol, though.

“I thought you were in Belarus.” He squeezed Peter’s shoulder once, and something in his tone made him acquiesce even as his mind rebelled, stepping aside so he wasn’t pressed between them anymore.

“I was.” She gave a subtle shrug of one shoulder. “Took care of business. Came back.” Her gaze flickered back to Peter. “Thought I’d stay under the radar for a while, but I guess that’s blown.”

“He’s hard to sneak up on.” Wade told her, slouching into a casual stance with one hand on his hip, but Peter knew that only meant he was even more ready to fight than usual.

“He’s standing right here.” He commented peevishly, crossing his arms over his chest. He hated how they treated him, like he was just some kid. Some kid to be watched over and talked about and condescended to.

Widow’s eyes stared right through him. She pushed off the wall and strode forward, causing the line of Wade’s shoulders to tense ever so slightly. “I’ll be around.” She paused beside Peter as she passed, and leaned in to speak beside his ear. “Just a little tip for next time, one spider to another… Your technique is sloppy as hell.”

Peter gritted his teeth, but kept his comments to himself as she slipped past him and disappeared easily into the shadows. Now that he knew who she was, he was a little less eager to throw his weight around. Even if he thought he could take her (and he really wasn’t so sure about that), she was still an Avenger. He had no interest in making her his enemy, even if he wished he could punch Tony in his arrogant little nose for continuing to stick it into other people’s business.

He turned on Wade, annoyance flashing through him bright and demanding. He opened his mouth to tell Wade off for stepping in like a fucking chaperone, but Wade beat him to it.

“Good game, little spider.” He mimed shooting a finger gun at Peter, then raised his forefinger to his lips and blew on it. “You caught a slippery one this time.”

Peter’s mind buzzed with white noise and his skin felt hot. “Don’t call me that.” He ground out between locked teeth.

“Oh? But then how will I differentiate you to our readers now that we have two spiders crawling around here?” He rocked forward on his toes, and Peter could tell he was grinning beneath the mask. “We all know she’s the big bad Widow and you _have_ to be the little one.”

He suppressed the shuddering chill that ran down his spine. “If you call me little one more time…” He warned, aggravation climbing.

“You’ll what? Punch me in the nose again?” Wade reached out – to do what, Peter had no idea – and he darted out of reach, leaping up to cling onto the opposite wall. 

“Don’t touch me so… so _casually_.” He hissed.

“How would you like me to touch you?” Wade sidled up to him, voice dropping low in his chest. “Intimately?”

Peter kicked him in the ribs, sending him sprawling flat on his ass with a cringe-worthy smack and a grunt of pain. “How about never?”

Wade’s wince was clear even with the mask hiding his expressive face. “Bless your body, bless your soul, reel me in and cut my throat.” He muttered as he climbed back to his feet, moving a bit stiffly for a moment before his usual aggressive sort of grace returned. He nodded to himself. “Yeah, we would.”

Peter turned on the wall and began to climb up towards the roof, his rage and fear and want and hate all churning like hot ash, trying to choke him. He didn’t know if he wanted Wade to follow him or not. Which probably meant that he really shouldn’t. “Fuck off.” He tossed over his shoulder, steeling his words to sound hard and angry.

“We all know it’s a bit more complicated than that.” Wade informed him, calm as anything. “You can’t keep running away from me.”

Peter bit down on his lip so hard he tasted blood. He wanted to jump back down and punch him again. Fight him. Fuck him. Make him hurt. And he realized, as the first few spatterings of warm rain hit his upturned mask, that leaving might be the best way to accomplish that. 

“Watch me.” He spat down as he reached the ledge of the rooftop and crawled over.

He could hear Wade shouting after him as he took off towards the city lights, watching the cement beneath his feet darken with the thickening rainfall.

“Are we demented or am I disturbed? The space that’s in between insane and insecure.”

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

The next afternoon, Peter got a call from a lawyer.

He sat down behind the giant boulders in Central Park with his phone cradled in his hand and tried not to puke. Or hyperventilate. Actually, he was probably more likely to pass out from lack of oxygen, because he couldn’t seem to figure out how to force air past the choking lump of dread in his throat.

This was it. They’d found him out. They were going to question him and entrap him and arrest him and he was going to end up in jail. 

The lawyer wanted to meet him in two hours. Just two hours. Was his life going to be over in two hours? Oh fuck. What was he going to tell Aunt May? This was just going to _kill_ her. He couldn’t do that to her, not after everything. He had to… Had to figure something out. He had to think about this objectively and… And…

Fuck. 

It was all over if they knew who he was. Even if they couldn’t prove that he’d killed Harry, they’d still have him on vigilantism and assault, at the very least. Maybe another murder if they threw Norman into the mix. Oh god… 

But how? How did they know he was Spider-Man? It was possible that he had screwed up somewhere along the way. Hell, maybe a camera caught him at the wrong moment. Maybe… Well, there were a million possibilities. But the one thing he couldn’t do was make assumptions about what they knew. That’s how the cops always tricked the criminals into confessions on TV; by pretending to know more than they did. 

So he would keep his mouth shut and he wouldn’t say anything remotely incriminating until he got a lawyer. Except he was already meeting with a lawyer. But they worked for Oscorp. Why hadn’t they sent a detective to talk to him instead? None of it made any sense and it felt like he was back in April, under attack and desperately but fruitlessly trying to figure out who the hell the Green Goblin was. 

He wished he never had found out. If he could just go back in time and do _something_ differently, maybe Harry wouldn’t be dead. Maybe his life wouldn’t be this walking disaster.

But that was beside the point.

Peter picked himself up off the ground, planting a shaky hand on the warm rock beside him for leverage, and ignored the midday joggers and dog-walkers as he wiped his cheeks dry and headed for the park exit. He went home to change, because if he got arrested he knew Aunt May wouldn’t want him to go to jail in a ratty old Smiths t-shirt; he’d look ridiculous trying to put that back on when he got out in thirty years for good behavior.

He’d been waiting for something like this to happen. He just hadn’t thought it would be so… terrifying. He’d expected a knock on the apartment door. A couple of cops, maybe even in full SQUAT gear if they thought he’d be trouble, a quick and painful arrest. If they already had all the evidence against him, then maybe he wouldn’t even have to say anything. They’d just declare him guilty and be done with it. He was only sixteen. Maybe he’d be sent to a juvenile detention center for a couple of years first, to ease him into it.

He didn’t want that to happen, but he’d deserve it if it did.

At four fifty-six, Peter was standing outside the reflective glass doors of Oscorp Industries. It felt like a lifetime since the he had last walked into the imposing building, and being here again was like being in a dream. It didn’t feel quite real. He expected something to be different now. Maybe a change in décor, or new security measures. But it was exactly the same as it’d always been. Even the receptionist sitting behind the wide marble-topped desk was the same.

He gave her his name, as a guest this time, and she directed him towards the set of conference rooms on the fifth floor that he’d never had cause to use before. His stomach fought with him as he rode up in the elevator, and he considered the very real possibility that he might have to take a detour to the restrooms to be sick. Although he hadn’t really eaten much since yesterday, so there wouldn’t be much to regurgitate.

He made it to the correct room without vomiting, so he attempted to steel his nerves with a shaky breath and knocked on the heavy wooden door. 

“Come in.” 

The lawyer’s voice was flat, and his appearance even flatter. He sat at the end of a long mahogany table, thin wire-framed glasses perched on a hooked nose and slicked back hair most likely covering a bald spot. He wore a suit that looked nice (as far as Peter could tell) but was as generic a style as he’d ever seen. The man was jotting something down in a black leather folio, which he folded closed and set aside as soon as Peter entered.

“You must be Peter Parker.” He stood up as Peter approached and held out his hand to shake. Peter did, and realized too late that his palms were coated in a thin sheen of sweat. He surreptitiously wiped them off on his jeans afterwards. “I’m James Feldman.” He nodded towards the closest empty chair, and Peter noticed that there were a set of manila folders lying closed on the table between them.

“Nice to meet you.” He mumbled, although it wasn’t, and took a seat in the leather-bound rolling chair.

“I assume you know why you’re here.” James stated, pulling one of the folders towards himself and flipping it open. It was full of documents, but Peter couldn’t read them from this angle. He wondered if that was on purpose, to make him nervous or something. If it was, it was working.

“Um. No.” He answered honestly, reminding himself not to make any incriminating statements. His voice felt unsteady, but he hoped the tremor in his short words went unnoticed.

James looked up in mild surprise. “Oh? My apologies, I thought you would have been expecting it.”

Peter swallowed hard, his pulse pounding in his ears. “Um…”

“No matter.” He picked up a stack of papers and shuffled them together with a couple of neat little taps on the table. “You’re here for the reading of the late Harold Theopolis Osborn’s last will and testament.” 

There was a moment of ringing silence, and the whole world seemed to shift slightly off angle. James the lawyer was setting his stack of papers down and pulling a fancy pen out of his leather briefcase. He set the pen precisely parallel to the papers, which lay perfectly perpendicular to the edge of the table. “These things are usually taken care of sooner, but the investigation hindered the process and the will was briefly and unsuccessfully challenged.”

He peered briefly over the edge of his glasses, as if he were expected Peter to respond. 

“Oh.”

He felt… Dazed. This possibility had simply never occurred to him. He hadn’t even thought about it, and if he had, he wouldn’t have guessed Harry would leave him anything. Maybe some of his personal belongings? The gifts Peter had given him over the span of their friendship? His chest panged with the thought.

In fact, he never would have thought Harry would _have_ a will written in the first place, and the realization that he did made his whole core ache.

“Well then.” James cleared his throat softly. “Shall I begin?”

Oh. It was happening very quickly, and Peter didn’t feel at all prepared. Didn’t these sorts of legal processes usually take longer? He tucked his hands between his legs and tried to keep himself focused. “Um. Yes.”

James pulled the papers towards himself, stared down at them, and began to read. “I, Harold Theopolis Osborn, residing at 40 West 92nd street, New York, New York, declare this to be my Will, and I revoke any and all wills and codicils I made previously.” He turned one page over, laying it face down beside the rest. “First and foremost, I direct my executors to pay any unsecured debt, taxes, legal and funeral expenses prior to the distribution of my estate.” There was more text on the page, but it apparently wasn’t relevant because James skipped it, turning that page over as well and moving on to the next.

“I give all of my personal property and all policies and proceeds of insurance covering such property, to my dear friend Peter Benjamin Parker.”

Peter stared, stomach dropping right out of his body. 

James kept reading. “I give all my residences, subject to any mortgages or encumbrances therein, and all polices and proceeds of insurance covering such property, to my dear friend Peter Benjamin Parker.”

He sat back, folding his hands in his lap, and looked at Peter. Peter was stunned. “That’s all. Short and sweet, unlike most wills, and certainly unlike most wills belonging to someone with such extensive assets.” He kept staring at Peter’s face, as if he expected him to say something, but Peter was… Mute. 

James blinked at him, and leaned forward to pull the second manila folder towards himself. “Before we sign everything over to you, the sole beneficiary, there are some legal restrictions to what Harold attempted to bequeath to you.”

Peter nodded blankly. 

James cleared his throat again, flipping the folder open and pulling out a thicker stack of papers. “From this moment on, Harold Osborn shall be referred to as ‘the deceased,’ and Peter Parker shall be referred to as ‘the beneficiary.’” 

Peter felt like he was having a sort of out of body experience. The air was very cold against his skin.

“Due to stipulations in the last will and testament of Norman Osborn, the deceased did not assume the role of CEO of Oscorp Industries and thus did not receive the accounts, investments or company stocks belonging to his late father. Those assets, along with any property of Osborn Senior’s valuing over one million dollars, shall be absorbed by Oscorp Industries. The rest of it belonged to the deceased, and now passes over to the benficiary.”

The words echoed in his mind, but they weren’t making a whole lot of sense.

“Any monetary accounts belonging to the deceased will be unavailable to the beneficiary until his eighteenth birthday, upon which date their contents will be transferred into his name.” James looked up at Peter. “Do you understand?”

Peter blinked at him. “Yeah.” 

“And do you consent to the aforementioned stipulations on your reception of this bequest?” 

“Yes.”

James pulled a phone out of his pocket and pressed a button, raising it to his ear. “Yes, could you come in here a moment?” He tucked the phone away again, flipped a piece of paper around to lay in front of Peter, and handed him the heavy pen.

The door to the conference room clicked open and a middle-aged woman dressed in a pantsuit moved to stand beside the table. “Brenda will act as our witness.” James explained, then pointed to a line near the bottom of the page. “Sign and date here please.”

Peter stared. He knew he should probably read whatever this was before he signed it, but he didn’t feel quite real at the moment and he just wanted to get this over with. He signed the paper.

“And initial here, please.” 

Peter initialed there.

The page was passed to Brenda, who bent over the table and signed on her own line, then slid back to James, who signed, dated, and produced a stamp to press an official little mark beside their names.

“Alright then, that concludes our official business.” James began to tuck the papers away in their respective folders and Brenda exited the room. “I’ll have copies of all this mailed to you by Wednesday.”

Peter stood clumsily, muttering an automatic “Thank you” under his breath.

“Oh, I almost forgot.” James stood as well, setting his briefcase on the table and pulling out a large Ziplock bag containing a packet of paper and a small silver key. “Harold’s penthouse has just been released by the NYPD. The mortgage is paid off through next year, and will continue to be paid from his accounts until such time as you decide to sell the property or otherwise alter the financials.”

He slid the bag across the table to Peter.

Peter picked it up, feeling a bit light-headed. The plastic crumpled in his hands as he looked up at the lawyer one more time. “Why?”

James’ eyebrows drew together. “Pardon?”

Peter cleared his throat. “Why, um, why is this happening now?”

The lawyer buckled his briefcase and slung it over one shoulder. “They’ve concluded the investigation. Officially ruled it a suicide.”

The blood rushing in his ears sounded like an ocean.

“I heard they found strong supporting evidence among his personal items, but I’m not sure what that was. The details should be released to the public soon.”

“Oh.” Peter stared blankly towards the window, his breath trembling through his lips.

So that was it? He’d… Gotten away with it?

He vaguely heard James speak some sort of parting words, and then he was exiting into the carpeted hallway and leaving Peter alone in the large, chilly room.

He looked down at the bag in his hands, eyes drawn to that little silver key.

He felt sick. Relieved, and absolutely sick with himself.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Peter’s hands shook as he turned the key in its matching shiny tumbler lock. He’d come straight here, unable to think of anything else from the moment the Oscorp lawyer had handed him that bag. The doorman let him up with a familiar nod, as if the past month and a half hadn’t happened. As if he were just going upstairs to visit Harry, and he would knock on the door and Harry would call for him to come in, because he lived in a fancy building on his own floor and never locked his front door if he was home.

But now the door was locked, with a bit of yellow tape residue on one side of the frame. And even if it felt like Harry would be waiting for him on the other side, mussing his hair as he read something on his laptop, or throwing a bag of popcorn in the microwave so they could watch a movie, Peter knew he wouldn’t be.

He had stood outside the door for at least twenty minutes before he could grip the key between his fingers and work up the courage to use it.

When the lock clicked open and the doorknob turned under his hand, Peter held his breath. He couldn’t breathe until he had slipped inside, shut the door behind him, and unsteadily typed the security code (which had been among the information printed on the papers he was given) into the little pad on the wall.

There was a soft chirp as the security pad informed him that the apartment had been disarmed, and then silence.

Peter turned around, pulse hammering beneath his skin. The kitchen looked exactly the same. There wasn’t even dust on the countertops, and there was a faint smell of lemons and cleaning supplies in the air, making it clear that someone had been by to maintain the space. He moved quickly through the apartment, suddenly driven forward with the urgent need to see Harry’s room.

He barely took note of the living room, the movie room, or the front office as he passed by, imagining Harry’s things ransacked or shuffled through, perhaps boxed up or moved somewhere. Would they have taken all of his things for evidence? 

He pushed open the bedroom door and froze on the threshold, nostalgia hitting him like a brick wall.

Not a single thing was out of place. From the rumpled bedspread to the posters on the wall and the shoes thrown in front of the walk-in closet, the room was exactly the same as it had always been. As if Harry were just in the bathroom brushing his teeth. In a moment he would come padding in with his feet bare and climb under the sheets. 

On the desk, sitting atop a couple of binders and books, was a sheet of paper in a translucent evidence bag. The red strip of tape along the top of it caught Peter’s eye, and he slowly walked over.

The paper was folded in half, and his name was written on the front in Harry’s tightly looping script.

Peter sat on the edge of the bed and ripped the top of the bag open, tearing it along its perforated edge and discarding the resulting scrap of plastic on the floor. He pulled the paper out and let the bag fall too, unfolding the note with his heart in his throat.

_My dearest Peter,_  
_I shouldn’t be writing you a note. I should be talking to you, like you’re always asking me to. Talking to you has always been easy, but what I have to say now is hard, and I’m weak. I can’t look you in the eye when I tell you these things, because I’m afraid you might change my mind. You always have been able to get me to do just about anything for you._  
_You’ve been everything to me._  
_I know that you’re not mine, but I wish you could have been. You make me better. You’re strong and kind and brilliant and beautiful, but I could never have given you what you deserve. I’m too fucked up. I don’t have the bright future that you do._  
_I know what you would say, If I told you everything that was going on with me right now. You’d tell me that I shouldn’t do anything stupid. That I should let it all go and give my life a chance. That I have things worth living for._  
_And if I had you, then that might be true. But I know you’re not mine._  
_It’s alright. I don’t want you to feel bad, so don’t go blaming yourself or anything stupid like that, okay? I know you. I know this will be awful for you, and I’m so, so sorry for that. I never wanted to hurt you._  
_I hope that, if you can’t be mine, you can find someone who will make you happy. Who will make you smile without a crease between your cute little eyebrows. Who can be there for you instead of constantly making you worry about them. I hope you have that, Peter. I really do._  
_I know you won’t understand why I have to do this, but I don’t have any other choice. It has to be me. I have to end this._  
_I hope that you won’t hate me, when this all goes down. I’m sorry that I couldn’t be better for you._  
_I’m leaving everything I have to you. I’d leave you the company too, if I could, but that’s out of my hands. I could give you the whole world and you’d still deserve more._  
_I love you Peter._  
_With all my heart,_  
_Harry_

Peter’s face was wet and sticky, the paper damp between his fingers. Some of the ink was running, so he set it aside.

The silence of his shuddering breaths broke with a sudden, violent hitch of a sob. He curled into himself, pressing his face to his knees, and cried.

He cried so hard it was difficult to suck in his next breath. He cried until his pants were stained with snot and spit and tears. He cried until the jagged aching hole gnawing at his insides began to go numb. He cried until he was completely desensitized to it and for a while he just sat there, breathing and feeling empty. Completely drained, like there was nothing left inside to hurt.

He made himself move after a while, crawling up the bed until he could press his face into one of the pillows.

It still smelled like Harry.

A fresh swell of tears broke over him, and he cried into the pillow until his throat was sore from sobbing. He writhed on the bed, trying to dissipate the horrible cutting pain that was tearing him up beneath the ribs. He thought it would go way after a while. That he would wear himself out and go back to being numb again. But it didn’t happen.

The pain just built. It came in waves, each one larger and stronger than the last, and knocked him down until he felt like it would never end.

It would never end, but it hurt so _much_. He couldn’t stand it. He couldn’t stand how much this hurt.

He got himself up somehow, holding one arm clutched tight around his middle, as if his insides might fall out in pieces if he let go. He stumbled his way out of the apartment and down to the lobby of the building, vision blurred with the tears that wouldn’t end. People looked at him as he made his way towards the doors, but if they said anything he couldn’t hear them over the hitching keen of his muffled sobs. 

It wouldn’t stop.

He felt like the pain would eat him alive and there would be nothing left. He wanted there to be nothing left, because at least then it wouldn’t hurt like this. 

The streets were loud with evening traffic, but none of it reached him. It was raining, a soft, steady sheet of tears falling from the sky, soaking all of him in misery. He’d left his suit at home when he went to meet the lawyer, and so he walked. He walked for what felt like miles. He walked until he reached a slightly worn, solidly cheap apartment building near Midtown. He went inside and up the stairs, and broke the lock on the door to apartment 8C. 

He’d known where Wade was staying for over a week now. 

He closed the door behind himself and padded shakily to the couch. It was new. Peter could tell from the lack of stains and the soft ridges of the corduroy upholstery. But it still smelled like comfort.

It smelled like Wade.

He curled up in one corner of the couch, making himself as small as possible, and closed his eyes.

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Song Credits:

Chapter Title:  
When It’s Cold I’d Like to Die – Moby  
Lyrics:  
The World That We Live In – The Killers  
Jesus of Suburbia – Green Day

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you SO FUCKING MUCH for the amazing artwork, A44. I wanted to commission a piece for the anniversary chapter, but couldn't afford to do so, and he went ahead and created this gorgeous picture for me.  
> Check him out, his work is incredible:  
> https://44art.tumblr.com  
> https://www.patreon.com/a44


	5. Warm Me Up and Breathe Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi again, lovely readers. 
> 
> It's been a while, huh? I'd like you to know that this long gap in between chapters is not overly typical of me. There's been a lot going on in my life these past couple of months, including but not limited to some family issues, starting a new job, and moving to a new city.
> 
> I'd like to thank every singly person who has commented, messaged me, or otherwise shown their support and urged me to continue with this work. Not that I would ever consider abandonment (I swear to fucking god I will see this through to the end unless I am literally dead), but the occasional kindly nudge of encouragement is helpful in keeping up my enthusiasm. 
> 
> You are beautiful creatures, each and every one.
> 
> Please enjoy this extra long installment. I wrote it just for you.
> 
> xx Sordid

**Wade**

**[White]**  
**{Yellow}**

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

_Hurt myself again today. And the worst part is there’s no one else to blame._  
_Be my friend, hold me. Wrap me up, unfold me._  
_I am small, I’m needy. Warm me up and breathe me._

_Ouch, I have lost myself again. Lost myself and I am nowhere to be found._  
_Yeah, I think that I might break._  
_Lost myself again and I feel unsafe._

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

It was past two in the morning by the time Wade was stomping up the stairs of his apartment building, teeth gritted in anger and sharp regret. He’d still be out looking except that there was absolutely no sign of Spidey anywhere in the city. Granted, it was a large city, but usually if Wade couldn’t catch his trail, he could at least tell where Spider-Man had been by tuning into the police scanner and tracking his signature hand-wrapped gifts. 

{Nasty little spider hiding in his web just hiding in the night hiding from _us_ we’ll get him we’ll punish him the itsy little biting boy how dare he fucking hide from us}

[Maybe you finally did it. You pushed and pushed and didn’t take no for an answer and now he’s done. He’s really done this time.]

“But we didn’t even _do_ anything.” Wade muttered sulkily, dragging his boots across the platform between flights. Sure, Spidey had been mad after The Kiss™ the other night. Mad enough to try to avoid him. But once Wade caught his trail again, he wasn’t shaken off like the flea he was. Peter had let him follow. And Wade had been careful; he hadn’t jumped into any fights, he hadn’t pushed his company within half a block of Spidey, he hadn’t even _talked_ to him. 

[But you did go all overprotective Daddy when he was hashing things out with Widow last night.]

{She’s dangerous, slicey dicey blades and hot hot bullets. Couldn’t let her hurt our precious little spider.}

[Cool it, Gollum. If you had half a brain left you’d have seen she was just there to watch him. Like a scary ass guardian angel sent by the iron dildo in the sky.]

“He was reckless.” Wade defended as he neared his floor. “And he doesn’t know how unpredictable she can be.”

[I’m not saying she wasn’t a threat.] Black Widow was always a threat. Wade could count on one hand the number of people who actually made him edgy, and she was one of them. [Just that Parker probably didn’t appreciate the assist.]

“I don’t care if he ran out of thank you cards.” He mumbled. “That doesn’t mean we –”

He froze, one hand braced against the wall as he rounded the corner on the eighth floor and caught sight of his door. A third of the way down, near the frame where the cheap white paint peeled, the wood was splintered. 

Someone had broken his lock. 

Wade draw Betty with his left hand and gripped a nice long trench knife in his right, steps turning silent as he crept towards the door. 

[Wait.] White hissed. [The door is closed. _It’s a trap_.]

{Who in the fucking multiverse is gonna try something like that? Besides, they wouldn’t need to bust the door in if they were trying to be sneaky. Any clumsy child with a bobby pin could pick that flimsy lock easy as slidin’ it into a nice loose whore.}

[He… May have a point.] White admitted as Wade pressed his back to the wall beside the door, listening through the thin plaster for any movement inside the apartment. All was silent. [Not about the distasteful explicit reference. But you’d have to be pretty stupid to leave such obvious evidence of a break-in only to lay in wait if you want to get the drop on someone.]

{Or just really, really confident in your ability to put Deadpool down.}

[…Fuck.]

Wade weighed his options, but he couldn’t think of anyone he knew with enough audacity and recklessness to leave the splintered door who was also dangerous enough to actually be a threat. Weapon X would’ve come here without a trace, lying in wait with at least thirty skilled assassins to get him under control. Nate could teleport; he didn’t need doors. And if the Widow wanted something from him, he probably wouldn’t know it until she’d already gotten what she came for.

Regardless, he was having a bad night. It would feel good to put a bullet in whoever had the fucking gall to break into _his_ safe house.

He tucked the knife grip against his palm and reached out, slowly and silently turning the doorknob between his fingers. He kept Betty held tight against his chest, ready to take aim, and pulled the door open just wide enough to slip inside.

[Good thing we oiled the hinges last week.]

He could navigate the three-room apartment in complete darkness, but it wasn’t necessary. He’d left a lamp on with a dirty shirt thrown over it, and the whole space was illuminated with a muffled glow. There was no movement when he came in, but a quick scan pulled his attention to the shape of someone sitting on his couch.

Wade moved around the edge of the room with panther steps, raising his handgun to level with the intruder. His index finger tightened against the trigger, eager for the bang, the jolt, the earthy acidic burning smell staining the pads of his gloves. It was a new couch, but all the rest of his shit was bloodstained anyway; it was only a matter of time.

{Do it Wade _get himmmmm_ }

He allowed himself a small, grim smile, lips parting around the words of a quippy goodbye, when the person moved.

Wade yelped in alarm, jerking the Beretta up towards the ceiling before it could go off. “Holy shit.”

Peter was sitting on his couch.

{Holy shit!}

Peter Parker was sitting on his couch. Not Spidey. Peter. Sitting there curled up into the corner, almost wedged between the cushion and the arm of the couch. He’d just raised his head enough for his profile to be seen, but it was sufficient to recognize him and make Wade’s heart try to twist up and strangle itself at the realization of what he’d almost done.

“What the fuck, Peter?” His words came out low and strained as he holstered his weapons and stalked back the way he came to kick the door shut, using the motion to keep his edging panic at bay. He’d almost… Fuck.

{Fuck.}

He took a deep breath and noticed that his hands were shaking, the barest tremor of panic following the floaty blank feeling in his head. 

[He doesn’t look right.]

Wade paced back to the front of the couch and paused to look, fingers twitching where he planted them on his hips. He pushed himself past his initial

{Holy fuck it’s fucking _Peter_ he’s so pretty oh my god he’s here and his hair is a mess and he’s on our couch and he’s so _fucking_ beautiful}

reaction and tried to take in the details. Peter looked thin. He took up much less room than Wade remembered, but maybe that was just because of the way he was curled up, hugging his knees to his chest and tucking himself almost aggressively into the corner of the couch. The light was dim, but Wade could make out the large bruising shadows of sleeplessness under his eyes, heavily etched into his pale skin. And his face, Wade noticed with a clench of anxiety in his gut, was a fucking mess. His cheeks were blotchy, angry pink splashed unevenly against the unhealthy pallor beneath. His lips were chapped and raw, eyes puffy and irritated and eyelashes clumped together with moisture. And his expression…

It terrified Wade to see him look so tired. So despondent. The absolute exhaustion spelling itself out in his parted lips and hooded eyes was almost enough to mask the jagged edge of pain underneath, and Wade had already taken a step forward to take Peter’s chin between his fingers and look him over for injuries before he caught himself and lurched to a stop, hands clenching into fists where they fell at his sides.

Peter’s hair was wet. Kind of. It was in that partially dried, sticky looking phase that made it clear it had been recently soaked and quite certainly not combed out afterwards. It stuck to his neck and had grown long enough to lick the underside of his jaw. And his clothes looked heavy, stiff and sticking to his body. His jeans were too dark and the fabric of his worn button-down was clearly water-logged. It looked like he had sat down soaked to the bone and hadn’t moved for several hours.

{It rained earlier! What did he do, take a stroll in the downpour and come here to drip on our couch?}

Wade had been out in the rain too, but he had ducked into a Starbucks and made some nice hipsters and rich yoga moms uncomfortable while he sat sipping a venti mocha cookie Frappuccino for an hour until the sky stopped pissing on everyone. It had been a bit early to look for Spidey anyway, and now Wade’s evening of fruitless searching was making a lot more sense.

[He came here.] White couldn’t keep the blank surprise from his words, and Wade had to tamp down on the strange squirming feeling behind his heart.

“How did you find my place?” He asked, voice much softer than before. He wanted to ask what happened. He wanted to ask _why_ , but he was afraid Peter would shut down. Or bolt. Either seemed like a likely outcome considering how he’d been acting over the past few days. 

Peter seemed to rouse himself, blinking slowly and shifting where he sat, arms tightening slightly around his legs as straightened up just a bit, lips pressing together for a moment before he wet them with his little pink tongue. He lowered his eyes to the window across the room.

“I’ve known for a while.” He stated, words hoarse and more than a little rough. It sounded painful. He cleared his throat. “You talk to yourself. And your voice is very…” He made an indecipherable face, nose crinkling ever so slightly as his eyebrows drew together. There was a slight twitch in the column of his throat. “Distinctive.”

{He’s been listening in on us? Oh my god. I don’t know if I’m flattered or if I wanna spank his sweet little tush until it’s all red and tender.}

[He can only hear one third of our conversations, idiot. Though it is rather impressive, to zero in on our voice from what must be miles away…]

Wade swallowed, putting aside that interesting little revelation for now.

“Why…?” He trailed off, not wanting to give the impression that he didn’t want Peter here. 

A frown twitched over his mouth and brown eyes flashed, emotion sparking beneath the mask of dull fatigue. “You know where _I_ live.” He snapped, the bitter acid on his tongue making it quite clear how he felt about that. “Now we’re even.”

He’d misunderstood. Wade fought back a frown of his own, taking a tentative step closer. He counted it as a win when Peter didn’t crawl over the back of the couch just to keep away from him. “You could’ve just asked me, Baby Boy.”

The term of endearment slipped out unbidden, as instinctual as the soothing murmur his tone had adopted. Peter flinched slightly, but didn’t otherwise react to the slip-up. 

“No reason to.” He muttered crossly, shifting his knees in closer to his chest and lowering his glare to the other side of the room once more.

He was still being petulant, which was probably a good sign all things considered. Wade wanted to ask again, to clarify that he wanted to know why Peter was here at all, but he suspected doing so would burst whatever fragile bubble had formed in this apartment and Peter would no longer be sitting on the damp corduroy upholstery looking like he walked to hell and back and then sat down and just stayed there.

{Something happened.}

[No shit, Sherlock.]

The fear that had been simmering under Wade’s skin since he recognized Peter gave a little jolt in his stomach, reminding him of its presence, but he ignored it in favor of pushing his luck a little further.

“You must be uncomfortable.” He murmured, taking another half step forward with hands slightly outstretched, as if he were approaching a frightened cat. “Want to get out of those wet clothes?”

Peter stiffened, his fingers tightening around the fabric of his jeans, pulling them taught and creased against his calves. “Yeah, you’d fucking like that, wouldn’t you?” He spat over his knees, mouth twisting into a nasty snarl. 

{Toooooo far. We pushed it too far. But damn he’s cute when he’s mad… Look at that _face_! Fuck, when was the last time we saw his face?}

Wade shook his head, raising his hands in the universal gesture for ‘don’t shoot me, I’m innocent.’ Before he could explain that he would definitely offer something dry for Peter to change into (even if he would be swimming in the larger clothes), the boy’s body was wracked with a violent shiver. He clearly tried to suppress it, hands clutching tight enough that his knuckles turned white and teeth snapping together in the quiet of the room, but his shoulders shook and his jaw trembled terribly. 

“You’re obviously freezing.” Wade pointed out helpfully.

“And whose fucking fault is that?” Peter sneered through clenched teeth, ducking his head to wipe his nose on the knee of his jeans. “You have the air blasting like you want the whole goddamn building to get hypothermia.”

[Nobody asked you to come for a visit.] White hissed venomously.

Wade shrugged sheepishly. “I run hot.”

{And leather keeps the heat in. Like wearing a whale.}

“Yeah, like a fucking furnace.” Peter griped under his breath, almost too quietly to be heard. 

Wade suppressed the smile twitching at the edges of his mouth and bent to pick up a clean (no blood at least) sweatshirt from the floor. “Here.” He stepped forward again, closing the distance between them and holding it out. “At least put this –”

Peter lashed out, knocking the sweatshirt from Wade’s hand. “Don’t _fucking_ touch me!”

Wade stared, frozen and wide-eyed beneath the mask. He’d been expecting this, but it was still a sight to see, Peter glaring up at him, eyes glazed with fear as much as with anger, chest heaving with every panting breath he took. He was so tense he was practically shaking.

Wade’s heart fucking broke for him. “Peter…” He breathed.

And Peter just… Dissolved. 

He collapsed in on himself, going limp against the arm of the couch like it took too much energy to remain upright. His hair fell messily across his cheek as his head hung. His lips parted and his eyes closed, brow crumpling in despair, and he sobbed. His shoulders shook and the wild, keening sound that crawled up his throat made Wade’s heart _lurch_. 

Wade crossed the distance between them in two quick strides and sank onto the couch cushion beside him. Personal space be damned, he reached out and took Peter by the waist, hauling him into his lap. He was a boneless, heavy thing in his arms for a moment, and then he was clinging to Wade, wrapping around him like a desperate child. His arms went around Wade’s neck and shoulders, one hand gripping like a claw at the back of his suit, and squeezed him so hard it hurt. He pressed his face into Wade’s neck, right beneath his jaw, and wept into the leather. The mercenary held the hero, one arm tight around his small waist and the other hand running gentle lines down his shuddering spine.

“Sh… I got you, Baby Boy. I have you. Go on and cry, it’s okay.” And he did. He cried harder, the force of his sobs punching out of his throat in a way that sounded painful, like they were being ripped from his stomach. Wade could feel the cold, heavy wetness of Peter’s clothes sticking to his skin, his whole body trembling with the force of his despair. It made Wade’s throat tighten and ache.

{Fuck… He’s so pretty when he cries.}

Wade ignored the commentary, trying to make quiet, soothing sounds as he continued to pet Peter’s back. He probably should have wondered what it was that was causing this visceral heartbreak, but he honestly didn’t care right now. It didn’t matter why. Peter was in genuine, gut-wrenching, bone deep please-fucking-kill-me-now-this-hurts-too-much pain, and Wade would do anything to make it stop. Anything. If he thought there was someone out there that he could kill and make this better, he would fucking obliterate them. Cut them into pieces so small they would never be seen again. 

Even If that person was himself. _Especially_ if that person was himself.

He wished it were that simple. But he knew it wouldn’t do Peter any good. Not right now. He pressed his mask-covered mouth against Peter’s hair and held him a little tighter, instinctually rocking back and forth ever so slightly, matching the hitching rhythm of his sobs. He throbbed with the need to do _something_ to make this better, and it only hurt more to know that there was probably nothing that could. 

“I’d happily take all those bullets inside you and put them inside of myself.” He murmured, hand migrating to cradle the back of Peter’s head.

When he could hear the raw, labored rasp of air choking off between the agonizing heaves of Peter’s cries, he resumed the steady stroke of his hand down the back of his neck, between sharp, shaking shoulder blades. “Breathe…” He encouraged gently, listening to Peter try to suck air in between the uncontrollable waves of his sobs. “Breathe, honey, it’s okay.”

Peter choked, going silent for a moment, before he gulped in a long, quivering breath. The oxygen gave his next cry more strength, renewed after a temporary weakening. It also gave him words, pressed messily and nearly unintelligibly into Wade’s shoulder.

“No… No, I did it… I did it, it was me…” Wade could hardly make out what he was saying, but one short statement stood out clearly, sending a chill of horror across his skin. “I killed him.”

[Peter… Killed someone?]

White understood the gravity of that. Peter was Spider-Man. They shared the same innocence, the same unwavering moral code. Killing someone wasn’t the casual everyday event that it was for Deadpool. It would change him. He’d been rougher with the criminals he caught lately… Had he gone too far? Let go of his strength and accidentally snapped a fragile little neck? No matter how callous and grim Spidey had been acting recently, Wade knew him. He knew the guilt must be eating him alive.

“Who, Pete? Who did you kill?” He murmured, keeping his voice low and soothing.

For a long moment, Peter just sobbed harder. The admission, when it came, came broken and wretched, weighed down with a misery and self-hatred that touched something deep and uncomfortably familiar in Wade’s chest. “H-Har… Harry. I k-killed him… I killed Harry.”

Wade tried not to let it show how those words left him reeling, skeptical and terrified of the implications settling in his bones, but he knew Peter wouldn’t miss the momentary stillness of his body. He tried to gloss over it. Tried to rationalize it. Peter may _believe_ that he was responsible for Harry’s suicide. Wade could tell he’d always been a tragically self-sacrificing boy, putting far too many heavy loads on his slim shoulders. 

“Baby Boy…” He squeezed him gently, speaking into his hair. “I know you feel that way, but it’s not your fault, okay? He made his own choice, and –”

“No.” Peter pulled back so Wade could see his eyes. His face was wet and flushed and splotchy. “I _killed_ him, Wade.” He gripped Wade’s katana straps in his fists and tugged, the words tumbling from his mouth harsh and urgent. “We fought and he had a gun and I, I told him who I was and he… He was falling and I shot a web and b- _broke_ him, I broke his s-spine and he… And I… I hid the b-body… I…” He dissolved into tears again, slumped in Wade’s lap, the sobs sore and hoarse in his poor throat.

“Fuck…” Wade wrapped him up in his arms, tucking Peter’s head back under his chin. 

{Holy _fuck_.}

[No wonder he’s so fucked up over this.]

{Does this mean we can be murder husbands now?}

[And you, Wade. You weren’t here.]

“I t-tried to… Call… I tried to call you, I…” Peter stumbled over the words, but they still cut sharper than blades. 

{Oh shit. He needed us, didn’t he?}

[He needed you. And you left.]

“But you weren’t there… You weren’t… Wade, you were g-gone… You were just… Gone… I needed you and you were _gone_.” The wail of his last word choked off into a sob, more painful than all the rest. 

“I’m so sorry.” Wade breathed around the lump settling in his throat, fingers trembling where they gripped the sodden fabric at the back of Peter’s shirt. “I’m so, _so_ sorry.”

It wasn’t enough. It would never be enough.

[No. You left him like this. Left him to hurt. It’s your fault he’s in so much pain.]

{False.} Yellow hissed with sudden vehemence. {It’s _your_ fucking fault you spineless, miserable excuse of a shield. You did this. You might as well have slipped a knife between his ribs and twisted it nice and good. At least that we could have _enjoyed_ for five measly seconds. This… This is just… Vile. All of it. _Fuck_ this. I mean at least the brat is dead but it should have been us. We should have put a bullet between his pretty blue eyes and been done with it. Then Spidey wouldn’t be hurting like this.} His poisonous anger dissolved in a heartbeat, fading into a pathetic whimper. {He’s _hurting_ , Wade. He hurts. Make it stop.}

The inside of Wade’s mask was wet, and he had to stifle the urge to reach beneath it and scrub the weakness from his eyes. Yellow was right. Peter was hurting and Wade had to do something. Even if it was just sitting here and taking it, he had to. He couldn’t run away again. Peter had come here. He’d come to Wade’s home, and cracked open his rotting heart for Wade to see. Even if he just meant to punish him, Wade couldn’t cast off this blinding display of vulnerability. He couldn’t bear to.

His katanas were digging into the flesh of his shoulders, but he ignored the discomfort (which was really nothing beside the vast throb of pain and self-loathing making its home in his stomach). He sank further into the couch and shifted Peter until he was cradled against his chest, one of his arms hooked under Peter’s knees and the other supporting his back. He felt so light. Like he weighed nothing at all. 

“I know it doesn’t make it better, but I’m sorry.” He spoke softly and he wasn’t entirely sure Peter was listening over the sound of his breaking heart, but maybe it didn’t matter. “And I know that you didn’t mean it. You couldn’t. Not really. You’re not a monster, Pete.”

Peter made a pitiful sound. “I am.”

Wade felt like he was being stabbed in the gut. “You’re not, Baby. I know monsters, okay? And you…” He pressed his face into the boy’s hair and took a deep breath, smelling leather and sweat and damp and something light and sweet and _Peter_. “You’re not a monster.” He whispered. “You’re a fucking angel.”

He wept weakly, curling in closer to Wade’s body.

Wade knew better than most that sometimes, you just need to cry until there’s nothing left. Like wringing out a wet washcloth. Watch the water drip down the drain and keep squeezing until there’s nothing left to come out. It may be painful, but in the end you’re almost dry. Not quite, but almost. So he let Peter cry. He rocked him gently back and forth. 

He sang under his breath, quietly enough that he didn’t really intend to be heard, but he knew Peter’s ears would pick up the words anyway. “When the tears come streaming down your face. When you lose something you can’t replace. When you love someone but it goes to waste. Could it be worse?” Wade closed his eyes, barely mouthing the last line. “And I will try to fix you.”

It took a while. Wade wasn’t sure if Peter’s eyes were producing tears anymore, but his chest hitched and his arms shook with feeble cries long after the sounds stopped falling from his open mouth. Eventually he went still, not moving but for the short, fluttering breaths he took every few seconds. Wade couldn’t see his face where it was tucked against his shoulder, but he thought for a moment that he might be sleeping. He hoped that he was. But when Wade lifted his head and tightened his hold ever so slightly, Peter stirred, and sniffed. He craned his neck to one side and was met with Peter’s open eyes, glassy and dazed beneath their swollen lids, staring sightlessly across the room.

He took a breath, and stood up. Lifting Peter had always been ridiculously easy, and it took no extra effort to carry him across the room, even when he shifted to wrap one hand around Wade’s bicep and balance his weight. He deposited Peter on the kitchen counter, careful to keep a solid grip on his shoulders until he was sure he could sit up on his own. Even then he didn’t withdraw his touch, keeping one hand planted securely on Peter’s waist as he leaned over to yank a clean dishtowel off the stove. He reached a little further to stick the towel under the faucet and turn on the warm water with one hand, keeping his body planted in front of Peter’s while he dampened the cloth. 

When he brought it up to Peter’s face and wiped gently at the messy tear tracks running down one cheek, Peter blinked, but didn’t otherwise react. His eyelashes were stuck together, making them look darker, like little spiders against the pale of his skin, blooming from the glistening beauty of his eyes. 

{So pretty when he cries.}

“Hey.” Wade murmured, carefully swiping the warm cloth under one eye, then the other. Peter’s gaze flickered up to his, and then down again, the slightest quiver running over his bottom lip. “What is it, honey?”

A soft little breath huffed out between his lips. “Your…” His voice broke, strained from all the crying, and he had to try again. Wade had never wished more for a stash of Sleepy Time tea to miraculously appear in his cupboard. “Your mask.”

Wade tried not to stiffen, focusing hard on cleaning the drying tears and snot from his boy’s face. He was quiet for a long moment, though he knew what Peter desired, could see it in his averted gaze. “You want me to take it off?” He finally asked, hushed voice not reaching beyond the little bubble of space they existed in.

Peters hands tangled weakly in the front of his shirt, and he nodded slightly, chin tucked down against his neck. 

{Why the fuck does he wanna see this fucking mess? He hasn’t cried enough tonight?}

[He’s trying to punish us.]

No… No, Wade didn’t think that’s what this was. Not that he wouldn’t deserve it if Peter did decide to poke at his deepest insecurities with a blunt screwdriver, but this was… Something else. And so he ignored the painful pounding of his heart and the dread making his veins feel icy, reaching up with his free hand to untuck the edge of his mask from the collar of his suit. He hesitated for a moment, a brief, bitter panic turning the back of his mouth sour, before yanking it up and off. 

Because he would do _anything_. Anything for Peter.

He stood frozen, waiting for those bourbon eyes to find his bare, ravaged skin and stare. But Peter didn’t even glance his way. He just reached out with one hand, lightly wrapped his fingers around a katana strap and turned his head to wipe his nose on the cooling cloth Wade still held up to his face.

Wade let out a breath he hadn’t been aware of holding, something loosening and tightening in his stomach at the same time. He felt flushed, and he gently tucked a clean part of the cloth up under Peter’s nose. “Blow.” He whispered, and Peter did. It made something hot squirm beneath Wade’s abs, and he tried not to think too hard about that as he folded the cloth over and gently wiped over Peter’s mouth and under his jaw before discarding the dishtowel on the counter.

He settled one hand on Peter’s thigh and pretended he didn’t hear the tiny hitch in his breath, reaching up with the other arm to pull a plastic Captain America cup out of the cabinet. He leaned over again to fill it with cold water from the sink, then he brought the rim of the cup up to Peter’s mouth. “Drink.” 

The column of Peter’s throat contracted as he swallowed. “Not thirsty.” He breathed, turning his head to the side.

Wade’s hand rose in a flash, gripping Peter’s chin between his thumb and forefinger and jerking his face back around. “Drink.” He commanded again, letting the word roll from the back of his throat like a growl. 

Brown eyes finally flicked up to his and lingered, _burning_ for a long moment before Peter parted his reddened lips and tucked the blue rim of the cup between them. Wade pressed his tongue to the back of his teeth and tipped the cup, pouring water over his velvet tongue. 

Peter swallowed once, twice, three times before his eyelashes fluttered and he raised one hand to wrap around Wade’s wrist, urging his hand up until he had drained the whole cup. Wade let go of his chin and refilled the cup. Peter took the second serving in his hands and drank it on his own. And the third. And the fourth. Halfway through the fifth he set the cup down on the counter beside him and wiped his mouth with the back of one hand, finally sated.

{Poor little spider was parched, wasn’t he?}

[Well, he practically leaked all his bodily fluids onto Wade’s suit and couch.]

{Not _all_ of them…}

[Shut up.]

“You’ve been sitting in cold, wet clothes.” Wade stated, picking lightly at the sleeve of his shirt where it stuck to his arm. “You’re going to catch something.” He wasn’t actually sure if Peter could catch a cold with his healing factor, but he wasn’t keen on taking the chance. “I’m going to change you into something dry.”

He didn’t give him a choice, scooping Peter into his arms and carrying him towards the bedroom, but he received no complaint. He was subdued, startlingly compliant as Wade set him down on the bed and reached over to turn on the lamp. The room was bare. He had never gotten around to decorating and he’d only left a duffel bag full of weapons sitting in the corner and some clothes dumped in and around the suitcase that sat beside the closet. At least there were clean sheets on the bed, and a new pillow. No bloodstains marring the navy cotton. 

The light was still muted, filtering out from under a yellow lampshade that Wade liked to think of as an aesthetic choice even though it was probably just old and kind of dirty, but it was brighter than in had been in the other room. Wade took a moment to look carefully at Peter’s downturned face, taking in the hollow lines under his cheekbones and the purple smudges beneath his eyes. If he didn’t know better, he would have thought the boy looked sick. Like maybe he had the flu. Or a dreadful terminal illness.

He bent over the bed, only hesitating for a moment when he realized the movement might cast his face in more direct light. “You look exhausted, Baby Boy.” He murmured, reaching up to lay one gloved hand over the side of Peter’s face and swipe his thumb over that sad tired bruise. He could feel the light shiver that traveled down the back of Peter’s spine, feel it in his fingertips. “You been sleeping much?”

Peter gave a weak, noncommittal shrug, eyes still trained on the carpet, and Wade tightened his hand, hooking his thumb under Peter’s jaw and tipping his face up until their gazes met. 

“Have you been sleeping?” He repeated himself, letting a thin, silvery thread of steel weave into his words. 

Peter’s lips parted on a soft exhale, and Wade watched with a heady rush of warmth as the dark of his pupils contracted, then expanded ever so slightly. Peter shook his head minutely. “Not much.” He answered on a whisper.

{Good boy.} Yellow purred, stirring with satisfaction and a churning sort of want that had Wade standing straight again, putting a little distance between them so he could breath. Try to breath.

[He doesn’t need to be sexed up right now. He needs a dry fucking set of clothes and a ten-gallon serving of ZzzQuil™.]

White was right. “You need to try to get more rest, Petey.” He scolded gently, in a soothing voice that he hoped said ‘I just want you to be healthy and happy, and if you can’t be happy than I at least want you to stop looking like a depressed zombie’ and not ‘be good or Daddy’s going to get out the supple leather riding crop.’

{Fuuuuuuuck}

Peter’s sad doe eyes darted away and he dropped his head again, hunching subtly in on himself. 

Wade frowned, lifting his hand to brush a clump of hair off his forehead. “What is it, sweetheart?”

He cleared his throat, but his words still came out more breath than sound. “I have… Nightmares.”

Wade thought he might choke on the horrible smothering guilty regret that surged up through him like a sob. He looked so _young_. So young and miserable and ashamed. His hands tucked under his thighs like he was keeping himself in line. He looked scared, too. On the verge of breaking, a tremble on his lips and a crease in his brow. Wade stepped forward, into Peter’s space, legs brushing knees as he cradled the back of his head and pulled him in, other hand spreading across bony shoulder blades. 

Peter slumped against him, pressing his face into Wade’s stomach and inhaling shakily. 

[If your dreams are far too real.]

{Let me in them, then.}

[I’ll slowly change the view.]

{I will soften them, then.}

Wade let his eyes slide closed for a moment, dwelling on the sharp ache of protectiveness lingering under his ribs. “Me too.”

A little shudder ran through Peter’s body, and a small sound got muffled in the leather above Wade’s utility belt. He pulled back, running his hand down Peter’s spine. “You’re cold.” 

He toed his boots off and kicked them aside as Peter blinked dazedly up at him, then sank to his knees so they were eye to eye. Carefully, gaze flickering over Peter’s face before dropping to the task at hand, Wade untied his scuffed black converse and slid them off his feet one by one. He could feel through his gloves that they were heavy with the water they’d absorbed, and he wrapped a hand around Peter’s left ankle, then his right, so he could peel off his socks as well. 

{Jesus his feet are so tiny.}

[Don’t tell me you’re developing some sort of disgusting foot fetish.]

{Why not? They’re perfect. And besides, it’s the least weird fetish we have.}

That was… Probably true, but Wade shoved the boxes to the back of his mind and reached for the buttons on Peter’s shirt. He watched with bated breath as inch after inch of smooth ivory skin was revealed, Peter’s chest rising and falling quickly beneath his hands. He let his eyes drift up to Peter’s face and found the boy staring at him intently, lips parted and cheeks dusted with a rising flush.

Wade’s mouth twitched towards a frown. “What?” He asked self-consciously, wishing briefly that he hadn’t decided to turn the lamp on.

Peter took a breath, and for moment it looked like he was going to say something. Something important, but then his lips pressed together and his brown eyes dropped beneath his eyelashes. “Nothing. I’m just… Cold.” He confirmed lamely. 

“Okay, Baby, we’ll take care of that. I’ve got something warm and soft for you to slip into.” He continued with the buttons, tongue flicking out over his dry lips as he uncovered the planes of Peter’s stomach. He slid the last button out of its loop and reached up to push the shirt off his shoulders, trying to keep his touch professional and not lingering. Despite his best efforts, he felt his breath catch in his throat as the whole of Peter’s torso was revealed. Peter leaned forward to help slide his arms out of the sleeves and Wade dropped the shirt to the floor without paying mind to where it ended up, too distracted with his staring.

He was so _skinny_. He’d always been thin and light without much in the way of mass packed onto his body, but he’d had a bit of muscle before. A nice smooth hardness that filled in the spaces around his hipbones and padded his flat stomach. Wade knew he was still strong as hell, but he didn’t exactly look it right now. Wade could see every one of his ribs when he breathed.

{Holy shit our baby spider needs to eat! Hasn’t anyone been feeding him?}

[Doesn’t look like he’s eaten a bite since we left.]

Peter freed his hands to cross his arms over his chest, trying to hide himself, but Wade caught his wrists and gently pried them apart, settling Peter’s arms back at his sides. 

“None of that.” He scolded lightly, reaching for the button on Peter’s jeans. He tried to move at an acceptable pace, not so quickly that the process seemed rushed, but not so slowly that it could come across as sensual, either. He was trying very, _very_ hard to keep this in friendly territory.

{When have we ever been just _friendly_ with Spidey? Or Peter, for that matter?}

It was one of Yellow’s rare insightful revelations, but Wade had gotten good at pretending not to hear those. He couldn’t help but hear the catch of sound stuck behind Peter’s teeth when he pulled down his pants’ zipper, though, and it made him want to lay the boy out on his bed and _eat_ him up.

[Easy, Hannibal. Not what he needs right now.]

So Wade gritted his teeth and peeled Peter’s sticky jeans off in one efficient movement. Then he forced himself to stand up and move across the room to his closet, bending down to pick up a hopefully clean hoodie off the floor. Crossing back to Peter and seeing him sitting there, flushed and almost naked on the edge of Wade’s bed where he slept and jerked off, looking small and unsure and soft and sweet and so so beautiful, kind of made Wade want to die. 

“Here.” He quickly gathered the back of the sweatshirt up in his hands and held it out for Peter to stick his head through. 

He did so, the neck of the hoodie catching briefly on his nose and wild mess of hair pushing through even more ruffled than before. He lifted his arms to slide them into the sleeves, taking a moment to pull his hands out of the cuffs since they were so big on him. Wade bent down to pull the fabric over his back, making sure he was covered, and as he tugged the sweatshirt straight Peter turned his head and caught Wade’s mouth against his.

It was fumbling and shy, the brush of his lips a bit off center, noses bumping and warm breath hitting his cheek. It was achingly sweet, and it caught Wade completely by surprise.

He pulled back a couple of inches and froze, searching Peter’s face for… _Something_. And Peter looked so lovely sitting there, his eyes wide and uncertain, a little hazy, a flush settled high on his cheeks. He looked young and unsure, like a boy stumbling through his first kiss and hoping for more, though he doesn’t quite know what’s supposed come next.

Heat _churned_ in Wade’s gut as a thin, helpless whimper caught in his throat. And then he wasn’t in control of his body anymore. He surged forward, pushing Peter back until his shoulders hit the bed and he was laid out underneath him, a perfect picture sprawled on the bedsheets in an oversized hoodie and damp boxers. Wade planted one knee between his spread legs and bent to crash their mouths together, kissing him deeply, soundly, chasing his taste. He spread one palm over Peter’s collarbone and pressed him into the mattress, swallowing the sweet, cracked little moan he let out in response. 

And it was like the last month and a half hadn’t happened. Familiarity flooded Wade’s body and it was just them again, just this, them, needing each other. Obsessed and wildly compatible, completely wrapped up in one another. Like the rest of the world didn’t matter.

Wade felt all his nerves light up like fiber optics when Peter’s hands landed on him, fingers curling over his bicep and around one leather strap stretched over his chest, holding on, keeping him close. He craved Peter’s taste like a drug but he wanted to put his mouth _everywhere_. He trailed kisses across the boy’s cheek and down beside his ear, tonguing at the line of his jaw and scraping teeth over the sensitive skin of his neck. 

“Wade… Wade.” Peter gasped and squirmed underneath his ministrations, his grip flexing like he wanted to pull the mercenary closer. “ _Wade_.”

He groaned into Peter’s neck, fumbling to unclip his belt and sling the blades off his shoulders, letting it all drop to the floor with a dull thud. He was breathless and dizzy with it, lips tingling where he pressed the words into soft, cold skin. “Yeah, Baby Boy, I’m here. I’ve got you, I’m here.”

Peter’s chest contracted, pushing out a moan that was more like a sob. “I need… Wade, I need… _Please_.”

He looked fucked, eyes squeezed shut and mouth fallen open to show a flash of his pink tongue pressed behind the line of his teeth, and Wade had never been so fucking hard in his life. He leaned back just long enough to peel his gloves off with his teeth, and then he was tucking his hands up under the edge of his hoodie, feeling Peter’s silken skin under the scrape of his fingertips. “Here, honey. This what you need?”

He could feel Peter shiver, feel each of his ribs under the spread of his hand, half his fucking torso encompassed in Wade’s eager grip. 

“Yes… Yes.” He gasped, spine arching under Wade’s imperfect touch. His head fell back, chin in the air, inviting Wade to dive back down and suck a lovely wine-colored kiss into his throat. He leaned forward into Peter’s body, squeezing around his ribcage as their chests pressed together. The movement pushed his thigh forward, slotting it against Peter’s erection, and the boy jolted up into the point of contact with a gorgeous little cry.

Wade’s hips rolled forward without any conscious decision on his part, seeking the delicious friction that he needed, but Peter was so small and the angle of their bodies was all wrong, and all he got was a frustrating, feather-light brush of smooth abs against the hardness straining in his leather pants. He pulled his mouth off Peter’s neck just long enough to adjust his grip and haul the boy further up the bed, manhandling him so his head met the pillow, hair curling out like a halo against the dark pillowcase. 

Peter made a hungry noise, legs falling open beautifully to let Wade settle between them, hips slotting together and knees hitching over Wade’s thighs like he was made for this. To be here. Right fucking here. A perfect fit.

And then they were kissing again, hot and wet and _deep_. And Wade’s pulse was pounding in his ears, his breath coming so heavy and short that it was hard to breath with his tongue attempting to make its way down Peter’s warm, pliant throat. But it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter if he was short on oxygen and his head was starting to float because Peter pulled on his shoulders and rocked his hips up, grinding their cocks together in a full-body heat flash of blinding pleasure. 

He moved on the undeniable wave of need, thrusting down to meet Peter’s rushed, messy rhythm, and they dry humped like fifteen-year-olds in the back of someone’s 1986 Camry after prom. Peter whined like he was drowning and Wade parted the slick slide of their tongues to let him suck in a desperate gasp of air, their mouths shiny and wet. And his Bambi eyes were staring up from under tangled lashes, pupils blown and hooded gaze impossibly heated. Then, chest rising and falling with quick, labored breaths, his little velvet tongue slipped out to lick Wade’s spit from his swollen lips. 

A growl rumbled in Wade’s chest and he couldn’t keep his teeth off that _lip_ , darting down to nip it soundly, a faint copper tang leaking over his tongue where the flesh was split and half-healed. His hips jolted forward on a particularly sharp thrust and Peter’s startled moan fed the arousal building beneath his navel. He reached down and grabbed a shameless handful of that glorious ass, digging his fingers in as Peter whimpered and rolled into it, grinding up against Wade with even more intent, chasing the friction. The thin cotton fabric of his boxers rode up easily, Wade’s fingers brushing skin. 

When Wade kissed the gasps from Peter’s mouth and let his fingertips slip between the smooth globes of his ass, squeezing ruthlessly, Peter pressed his whole body up against him like he was defying gravity and _keened_. 

“Oh fuck yes _please_ yes Wade fuck Wade please please Wade oh _god_ please Wade _please_.” 

Wade squeezed his eyes shut tight and halted the thrust of his hips with a strained grunt because he was absolutely going to come in his fucking pants if he didn’t. He was gripping one half of Peter’s ass and the line of his ribs hard enough to bruise, and Peter whined hoarsely in protest. Wade was pretty sure it had more to do with him stopping than the discomfort of his grip, though. 

“Fuck, Baby…” He swooped down on Peter’s open mouth and kissed it quick, sloppy and wet. “The things that come out of that pretty fucking mouth of yours…” 

Peter’s heat-pink face flushed absolutely crimson, the blush spreading down his neck and over the edges of his collar bone, and Wade groaned. “ _Fuck_.”

He reluctantly released his hold on the boy to plant one hand on the mattress and reach for the wobbly bedside table. He fished his bottle of lube out of the drawer and uncapped it onehanded, gaze flicking up to Peter’s glittering eyes for permission. The answering flutter of eyelashes and yank of his hands, pulling restlessly at Wade’s waist and bicep, was encouragement enough. 

He lifted his hand to dribble slick over his fingers, letting Peter take his weight for a moment, then let the bottle drop to the bed beside them and relocated his hands again. The look on Peter’s face when he slipped his palm up the leg of his boxers, thumbed his cheeks apart and circled one wet finger over the tight circle of muscle there, tracing it with careful pace and pressure, was downright sinful. No human being had the right to look that fucking angelic while they pulled their eyebrows together, wrinkled their perfect little nose, and dropped their jaw like they were having the best orgasm in the world. 

It only got worse when Wade pressed the tip of his finger inside, the fit tight as hell but the breech made easy with lubrication. Peter started making short, soft mewling sounds on each exhale, his fingers flexing unconsciously where they gripped Wade, digging into his flesh and making his whole body (but mostly his cock) thrum with a vicious aching need. He pulled his finger out and dipped it in again, teasing Peter’s rim, and watched closely as he shook apart beneath him. Wade ground his erection down on Peter’s, eyelids fluttering at the pleasure of it, but kept his focus on slowly working his finger into the tight heat, growing slicker with each push inside. 

“This what you want, Baby Boy?” He breathed onto Peter’s cheek, voice sticky with desire. “You want me in you?”

Peter whined and squirmed, pushing his ass back on Wade’s hand to take more of him, until he had sunk inside to the last knuckle. “ _Fuck_ … Yeah… W-Wade, yes, yes.”

He hummed his approval and rolled his hips down as he curled his finger, searching for Peter’s special little pleasure button. He must have brushed against it, and Peter went stiff against him, teeth snapping together over a startled cry as his grip turned painful, making Wade’s bones creak under his hands. 

A white-hot flash of _mine_ rushed through Wade like adrenalin, leaving a tingle in his limbs and a heady taste on his tongue. He almost said it out loud, claimed Peter with a growl and a bite and believed that it was true. But he froze, the word caught behind his heart, as he realized that he wasn’t sure if it was. 

Was he still… The only one who had been here?

For a moment he couldn’t move, one finger shoved up Peter’s ass and his breath gone still as a thousand sordid images flashed behind his eyes. Harry and Peter. Harry _having_ Peter. Like this.

“Wade?”

It was barely a second, but Peter must have noticed his internal crisis, and the mercenary’s name wavered on his breath. He had opened his eyes again and was staring up at him with such concern and expectation, like one word from Wade could make or break him. Like his whole being rested in the palm of Wade’s hand.

{He _better_ be fucking ours. Only ours. If that sniveling little goblin touched a single fucking inch of his skin I will follow him to hell and tear his eyeballs out of his fucking head and shove them down his throat. And cut his dick off.}

Wade’s tongue flitted nervously over his lips and he ducked his head, pressing his face into Peter’s neck so he wouldn’t have to look at him. “Yeah…” He breathed. “I’m here. I just…” He took a deep breath. “Can I ask you something?”

[I wouldn’t bring that up if you want to get laid tonight.] White affected an air of disdained disinterest, but Wade could feel the tremulous fear beneath his warning. There was a distinct possibility that Wade might not like what he heard, and some doors can’t be closed once you blast them open with a battering ram.

Peter shifted slightly beneath him, breath hitching, and Wade kindly slid his finger out, though he left his hand curled possessively over that luscious curve of flesh. Peter cleared his throat. “Y-Yeah.”

He sounded nervous, and Wade closed his eyes, hating himself because he _knew_ this was going to make Peter go all tense and anxious and sad and probably angry, and totally fucking ruin their moment. But he had to know. He had to. 

“Did you… Um… Did you ever… I mean, are you still…” He nudged his nose against the spot where Peter’s neck met his shoulder and lightly trailed his finger over Peter’s rim, causing him to twitch and suck in a breath of air, so deliciously. “You know…”

Peter pushed up into him for a moment, humming questioningly, before Wade’s meaning became clear to him and he froze, grip going limp and body falling still. Wade’s heart pounded an anxious rhythm in his veins. When Peter spoke, it was through clenched teeth and tinged with bitter anger. 

“What if I’m not?” He snarled weakly, grabbing cruelly at Wade’s hip and thrusting up against him. “Maybe I _was_ fucking around on you.”

Wade moved in a flash, making no conscious decisions before he was wrapping his fingers around Peter’s wrist and pinning it up above his head, other hand curling tightly around his thin, delicate neck. The wet touch of lube smeared over Peter’s fluttering pulse as Wade leaned in close and bared his teeth. 

“You tell me the fucking truth, Peter Parker.” His voice had dropped low in his chest, heavy with his command, and he squeezed Peter’s neck in warning. Felt his pulse jump. “Right. Now.”

For a moment he resisted, brown eyes fiery with obstinate defiance as he stared up into Wade’s, but in the next second he was melting. Thick lashes fluttered closed, hiding his eyes just after Wade saw them go cloudy with compliance, and his jaw unclenched to let his mouth open on a release of breath. He tipped his head back, baring his throat in submission, and went limp under Wade’s hold. 

“Yes…” He admitted, a soft fervency to his hushed words. “I’m still a… Virgin. I never… Never with anyone else.”

Wade went soft with relief, all the tension bleeding out of his muscles and the breath leaving his lungs. He loosened his grip on Peter’s neck and slid his hand up over his jaw, letting his bare thumb drift across that precious mouth. He leaned in until their breaths mingled, warm and damp.

“Good boy.” He purred, pressing into a slow, pleased kiss. Peter shuddered into it, a little noise catching in his throat. Wade stroked over the pulse in his wrist before releasing his hold to tangle his fingers with Peter’s, tugging lightly until their joined hands were nestled between their chests. He let the movement of their mouths slow with tenderness, a contented affection settling deep in his chest, before finally pulling back enough to trace his tongue over Peter’s bottom lip.

He pressed their foreheads together and gingerly thumbed at that lip, feeling it pull, so lush and wet and broken, against his skin. “You’ve been biting this lip, Baby Boy.” He crooned gently, ducking down to plant a small kiss there. “Don’t do that.”

Peter whimpered, his body soft and pliant as he surrendered to Wade’s administrations, fingers of his free hand catching lazily on the hem of his suit. 

“Kay.” He agreed sweetly, breath like honey on Wade’s mouth. Wade chuckled affectionately, absolutely endeared beyond reason by his easy and undoubtedly impossible promise, and hooked his thumb under Peter’s chin to tip his face up, their tongues meeting in a kiss once more.

“Can’t get enough of you.” He breathed, hips nudging forward. Peter hummed as he inclined his head for another kiss, fingertips finding their way beneath the edge of Wade’s top and skimming across his stomach, making his muscles flinch and quiver. 

“Take me.” He whispered, body rolling fluidly into Wade’s from thigh to chest, a delicious press that had Wade’s heart and breath stuttering behind his ribcage. “Please, Wade… Please have me.”

Peter had said a lot of pretty things to Wade, before their delicate spider web of a relationship got tangled and torn, but this was perhaps the loveliest thing that had ever been said to him. To _have_ Peter, to have him, to bear the privilege and responsibility of the exquisite, complex, _beautiful_ creature that he was, was incomprehensible and wonderful in equal parts. And, Wade realized with a heady flash, it was everything he had ever dared to want.

No. It was more.

And Peter wanted it. Wanted to give himself to Wade, here in this moment. It filled him to the brim with such awe, nearly overflowing, that it took him a few heartbeats to find his voice. He found Peter’s eyes, irises soft and warm like chocolate fur, and squeezed his hand. 

“You sure?” The words came on a whisper, careful not to break the muted atmosphere that hovered over them. Peter looked at him for a long moment, staring into his eyes like he could see into the center of Wade’s floating heart, and nodded.

“Yeah, Wade.” His lashes fluttered, pupils turned to inky pools flooding over the warm brown, and he pulled his bottom lip between his teeth, sharp white edge digging into the tender flesh. ”Want you.” 

He wasn’t even nominally annoyed at Peter for breaking his promise so quickly. His bad habit only served to strike a spark in Wade’s belly and catch fire to the napalm running through his veins. Wade bent his head and brushed their lips together, tonguing over the indentation Peter had left in his skin, tasting the sweet, faint copper. “I’m yours, Baby Boy.”

Then he kissed him in earnest, deep and hot, letting the slick slide of their tongue grow filthy and desperate, until Peter was moaning into it and Wade was _buzzing_. He located the lube on the bed beside them and managed to re-wet his fingers without halting the insistent movement of their mouths, then found his way back under the loose leg of the boy’s boxers. He sank one finger in without preamble, careful to move slowly but firmly, and had Peter gasping wetly and twitching up against him, thighs flexing on either side of Wade’s waist.

He worked him open slowly, mumbling affirmations into his open mouth that he doubted were registered, even if they were heard over the sweet torture of Peter’s ever-responsive noises. Somewhere between the second and third finger, Wade pulled back and maneuvered Peter’s thighs down so he could peel his boxers off and cast them aside, ignoring the choked protests of _no Wade fuck Wade please oh please don’t stop I need it I need you please Wade fuck I need you in me I need you I need you Wade please_. He pushed the sweatshirt up so Peter could feel the leather against his skin, encouraged by the lovely gasp he received when he did so, but he resisted taking it off completely. He liked the way Peter looked with the excessive fabric gathered up under his chin, the dusky peaks of his nipples peeking out from underneath. 

By the time Peter was slick and pliant around three fingers, driving his hips down on each thrust of Wade’s hand and clawing at the back of Wade’s suit, they were both growing a bit frantic. Peter had curled upwards, pushing himself as close to Wade’s body as he could be, and his teeth had found the sensitive skin at the top of Wade’s suit collar, scraping and biting and teasing until Wade was squirming, itching to tear his suit off, feel the press of Peter’s warmth, his mouth, his skin, _everywhere_. 

“Wade, _please_ ,” Peter moaned, a hitch in his voice as Wade ground their cocks together, both desperately hard and Peter’s leaving smears of precome against the leather that separated them. “It’s enough, please.” His clever fingers found the zipper of Wade’s pants and worked at it, getting it peeled down impressively quickly for how much he was shaking, so needy for it.

Wade groaned low and wrecked, burying his face in Peter’s hair and breathing him in, staving off the edge that he had felt building in his stomach since he’d first got inside. Peter had taken him very well, staying relaxed and stretching out with each thrust of Wade’s fingers, but he was still tight as a suede glove, and so fucking _tiny_ Wade wasn’t sure how he’d ever fit.

“Don’t wanna hurt you.” He mumbled against Peter’s scalp, twisting his hand to curl deeper inside, making the boy whimper and writhe. 

“Won’t.” Peter gasped, shoving his hand into the nonexistent space at the front of Wade’s pants and wrapping his fingers around his thick, aching shaft. Wade made a choked-off sound, hips jerking as Peter pulled him messily out of his restraints and stroked him dry, grip warm and rough and so fucking good Wade was going to come.

He sank his teeth into Peter’s neck, hard enough to make his movements falter with a groan, and stubbornly began to work a fourth finger into the stretched, tender edge of Peter’s hole. He tolerated it for a minute longer, allowing Wade a few sloppy thrusts once he’d fit his pinky inside, before he shoved insistently at Wade’s arm to get him to pull out. “Please.” He begged, trembling with need. “Wade, please.”

Wade sucked in an unsteady breath, head swimming, and sat back on his heels. Peter made a sound like Wade was _hurting_ him when he carefully slid his fingers out. His thighs fell open, knees brushing the sheets, and the rosy flush on his cheeks spread down his neck and disappeared under the rumpled sweatshirt only to reappear on the other side, staining across his heaving chest. His eyes were closed, lashes kissing dewy skin, and lips parted, hands buried in the bedsheets, gripping hard. 

Suddenly, Wade felt like he was outside his body, looking in on the scene like it was a dream. Like he was looking through a film that made everything glossy and hyperreal. Because this… couldn’t be real. Could it? But then Peter peeked out from under his spider lashes and whispered another _please_ into the syrupy air, and Wade was jolted back into his body. He was here. This was happening. 

He reached for the lube again, the tremble beneath his skin making his grip unsteady, and poured more of it over his hand. Peter made a short grunt of effort as he curled his shoulders off the bed and peeled the hoodie off, getting tangled in its sleeves for a moment before successfully flinging it aside. He lay back, hair wild and eyes glossy, and his mouth fell open as his gaze caught on Wade’s fingers where they were curling around his dick.

Wade stroked himself slow and tight, slicking up every inch of his shaft, and flexed his muscles to keep his orgasm at bay. Peter was staring, transfixed, almost apprehensive, as Wade’s fist moved over his cock. 

He licked his lips and tried to swallow. “Are you…” He had to clear his throat. “Are you sure?” 

Peter didn’t look up until he had stopped the movement of his hand, grip falling loose to let his erection lay heavy against his thigh. When he did, Peter made hazy eye contact for a moment before he understood what Wade was asking. The cloud of lust in his gaze cleared and solidified into a burning, consuming, undeniable need. Firmly, leaving no room for miscommunication, he nodded. “Yeah.” He reached for the hand Wade had left sitting on his knee and tugged, trying to bring him closer. “Now, please.”

He let out a faint, startled laugh and allowed Peter to pull him down between his legs again. The wet tip of Peter’s dick slid against his abs and Wade groaned, fire tearing through his body and waking him up again, kicking his urgency into high gear. He shimmied a bit and shoved his pants down over his thighs so he had more room, then slid one hand up the back of Peter’s thigh and pushed against his leg, opening him to the nudge of Wade’s tip between his cheeks.

Peter gasped and he dipped down to swallow it in a kiss, chasing the taste of him. Peter wrapped one arm around the mercenary’s neck, other hand finding his waist and digging in, making Wade squirm against his front. Wade pressed his thigh up further, pinning his hips to the bed as he wrapped his other hand around the base of his straining cock and very carefully pressed against Peter’s hole.

He tossed his head back and whined, fingers flexing where he held on, and Wade breathed against the line of his jaw, hot puffs of air trembling out of him as he felt his head catch on Peter’s rim and slowly began to push inside. 

Peter’s whole body went tense, hands turning to claws and heels digging into the backs of Wade’s thighs, stomach tightening and jaw clenching as he grunted at the sensation. Wade stopped, the fear of hurting him lending a knife’s edge clarity to his hazy mind. “Shhh.” He soothed, trailing kisses down Peter’s tensed neck. “You gotta relax, Baby Boy. I’ve got you.” He gave Peter’s leg a squeeze and the he did release a little, taking a couple of deep breaths to ease the clench of his muscles. 

“Yeah.” He panted, turning his head to nip at Wade’s ear. “Yeah, I’m okay. Keep going.”

Wade sucked a nice, dark bruise into the dip of Peter’s bony collarbone and tried not to feel like he was going to explode as he eased his hips forward, pushing an inch or two further in. Gods, he was so _tight_ and warm and _fuuuuuuuck_. He buried his face in Peter’s shoulder and bit his own tongue hard enough to taste blood, catching his moan in the back of his throat.

His hips jerked forward a little, burying another inch or so inside, and Peter cried out sharply. His back arched up off the bed and Wade couldn’t tell if he was trying to get closer or pull off his dick. He froze, raising his head so he could see Peter’s flushed, anguished face.

“What’s wrong, honey, did I hurt you?” He shifted his hand to Peter’s hip, rubbing a comforting circle beside the bone with his thumb.

Peter’s fingers flexed, his stomach clenched with each breath, he rolled his head like he couldn’t keep still.

“It’s… Ah… Just, uh… Just… Ng…” He shook his head, tugging at the collar of Wade’s suit, and Wade was ready to pull out, ready to call it all off even though his whole body throbbed like he had a high-grade fever. But then Peter clenched around him, thighs tightening, and Wade shuddered as pleasure surged in his gut and barely clamped down on it before he hurtled over the edge. “Don’t stop.”

He didn’t need to be told twice. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.” He pulled back ever so slightly before sinking forward again, slow and steady. It felt like sinking into the softest boa constrictor to ever exist. He bent his head and looked down the planes of their bodies, watching as he disappeared inside Peter’s tiny fucking body.

He felt dizzy at the sight, Peter’s punched out little noises making his head swim because he looked fucking _huge_ between Peter’s legs. And Wade had always known he had a big cock, but it had never looked so dangerously oversized as it did now, pushing impossibly further into him, like he must be forcing Peter’s organs aside just to fit.

The thought made his hips twitch forward again, and Peter sobbed.

“Oh fuck, oh god Wade oh my god, _fuck_ Wade please, oh god, oh god oh god oh god.”

He tried to stop. He really did, panting hard into Peter’s neck and digging his fingernails into creamy perfect skin, stretched thin over muscle and bone. “Oh _fuck_ Baby Boy… You feel so… So…” He trailed off, choking on a groan as Peter writhed under him. He felt sick with the pleasure of it, drunk on the tortured sounds that fell from the boy’s sinful mouth. He felt like he might die if he didn’t come. If he didn’t bury himself all the way in Peter Parker’s tight little ass and stain his insides, claiming him completely, irrevocably.

He needed to.

“Please.” He gasped, muscles twitching with the effort of holding still. “Gods, Pete, I need it I need you so bad, fuck. Please can I keep going _please_?”

“K-Keep… Keep going?” He clenched around Wade again, squeezing him like a vice, and Wade whined.

“Yeah, Baby.” He nudged forward, feeling Peter’s silky insides give under the pressure. “Let me put it all in.” He felt frantic, edgy, desperate like a junkie chasing the ultimate hit. “Please, honey, I know you can do it. You’re so good Baby, fuck, you can do it, you can take it all I know you can.”

Peter whimpered, a fucked out, floaty sound. “You’re not…” He craned his head up, trying to see down their bodies, and Wade arched his back, flexed his hips forward just a tad. Peter groaned like he was dying.

“Oh _fuck_.” He nodded dazedly, hair tickling Wade’s ear as he sank into the sheets again. “Do it. Want it, want all of you.” He turned to brush his lips over Wade’s jaw and managed to spread his legs impossible further.

Wade groaned low in his throat and clutched drunkenly at Peter’s hip, keeping him still as he pushed through those last couple of inches. He could feel Peter’s body flexing around him, struggling to make room, and he shuddered hard, the rush of his climax surging through him like a heat flash. He raised his head, fumbling messily for Peter’s mouth so he could kiss him, floating somewhere heavy and warm between the sweet throbbing in his gut and the ceiling. His hips slotted up against Peter’s, secure and comfortable like he was made to fit there, and being _in him_ felt… It felt like…

“Peter.” He breathed into the disorganized kiss. “Gods, I…”

{ _I love you._ }

He could feel Peter trembling against him, around him, and he shook too. Shook as he ground his hips forward, feeling Peter jolt and mewl into his mouth. “Peter… I gotta… Fuck, Baby, you feel so fucking good.”

His orgasm had built to the base of his cock, unavoidable, and he knew he couldn’t hold it off anymore. He took Peter’s tender bottom lip between his teeth and held it as he pulled his hips back just a couple of inches, Peter’s gasp falling sweet against his ears. It just took one thrust. 

He buried himself in Peter’s body and came so hard he couldn’t see. Couldn’t feel anything but the indescribable pleasure spreading through every inch of his scarred-up body, filling the holes and crevices and leaving nothing but warmth and euphoria. It slammed into him like a brick wall and his cock pulsed, spilling hot and hard into the sheath of Peter’s ass.

He came back to himself with great gulps of air, tasting iron between his teeth, and rolled his hips slowly as the aftershocks of orgasm throbbed through him. His heart was pounding, making the blood tingle in his fingertips. He smoothed over Peter’s abused lip with the tip of his tongue, humming affectionately as he blinked his eyes open. 

Peter stared up at him with wide-eyed revelation, flushed and hungry with a curious astonishment. He was clenching his abs, flexing unconsciously to pull Wade in with every little push of his hips. 

“Fuck, Wade…”

He hummed again, too blissed out for words, and let his weight press more solidly against the length of Peter’s body, feeling the stiff, leaking line of his erection caught between their stomachs. He reached up to push the hair off Peter’s forehead, the damp strands sticky with sweat, and captured his candy red mouth once again. Their kiss was slick and wet, tasting of salt and desperation.

Peter broke away with a grunt, a strand of glistening saliva catching between their mouths before breaking, falling against Peter’s chin. “Did… Did you…?”

Wade nodded, dropping sticky, open-mouthed kisses along Peter’s jaw and down to the sensitive spot under his ear, where his pulse fluttered just beneath the skin. “Yeah, Baby… Couldn’t help myself. You’re just _so_ …” He rolled his hips, grinding into the tight heat before pulling back a bit and pushing in all over again, and Peter moaned brokenly. “Fucking good. So good for me.”

He was as hard as ever, still aching for more, and he’d never in his endless life been so thankful for his healing factor. Peter must have still been feeling the stretch, the unyielding intrusion of Wade’s cock, but the extra lubrication made the slide easier, the friction smoother. Wade imagined spreading himself along Peter’s channel, pushing his seed even deeper inside the core of his body, and gritted his teeth against the primal urge to let go and fuck him into the mattress. Break him. Bruise him. Claim him.

Peter wasn’t making it easy to resist, helpless little noises catching behind his teeth as he pushed down onto Wade, taking advantage of the increased ease of movement. He looked half fucked out already, but there was a thrumming tension vibrating over every inch of his skin, a feverish desperation written across his face.

Wade adjusted his grip from its iron clutch on Peter’s hip, slipping his fingers up around his narrow waist instead. He planted his other elbow on the bed to support his weight but stayed pressed close, breathing over the line of Peter’s collar. Slowly, giving Peter time to register what he was doing, he pulled back several inches, until Peter’s rim caught on the ridge just under his head. He gave it a moment, listening as Peter held his breath and clutched tighter at Wade, before thrusting back inside in one smooth, long push.

Peter cried out, hoarse and breathless. “Oh _fuck_ Wade, fuck, yes, fuck.”

He didn’t bother to fight the shudder of pleasure that crept up his spine, scraping teeth over delicate skin and pressing his wordless praise into Peter’s collarbone as he slid back out and did it all over again. And again. And again. It was slick and tight and _good_ and Peter let out a hopelessly erotic cry every time Wade bottomed out. Wade groaned, hips snapping forward a bit more harshly when he realized that he must be punching into Peter’s prostate with each thrust.

He fell into the rhythm of it, not too fast that he lost control of himself, but fast enough to feel like he was chasing the edge again. And Peter moved with him, chasing after the same feeling. One particularly deep roll of Wade’s hips had him throwing his head back, hair a wild mess spread across the pillowcase and neck extending in a taught, pale, glistening line. Wade couldn’t help but latch onto it, working his lips over the column of his throat, tracing his trachea with his tongue. 

“Oh god, Wade. Fuck, I missed you so much.” Peter gasped the words, let them fall like they’d been sitting on his lips for days. 

Wade whimpered, wounded and relieved, and dragged his mouth up to press over Peter’s. His thrusts grew slower and gentler as he kissed Peter like he was precious, but they never lost depth. Peter parted his lips for him, let him slide their tongues together, taste the heat of his mouth, and when they broke apart to breathe he said it again, a near-sob of honest confession.

“I missed you _so_ much.”

He was shaking once more, trembling against Wade like he couldn’t quite hold himself together. Not without help. Wade let the movement of his hips taper off until he was just buried inside, pressing warm and secure between the smooth brackets of Peter’s thighs, and pressed a kiss into one corner of his mouth, then the other. He shifted a little to press one palm along Peter’s jaw and stroke his thumb across the line of his cheek until liquid brown eyes flickered open and met his. His damp breath was hitched and unsteady, and shiny tear tracks ran down unto his hairline. Wade stared into his eyes until he was sure Peter could see him.

“I missed you too, Baby.” He bent to kiss the tears off Peter’s eyelashes, chest aching and words heavy with sincerity. “Missed you like a knife to the stomach, every fucking minute of every fucking day.” 

Peter nodded almost imperceptibly, breathing out, and Wade kissed him again. They kissed slow, the gesture imbued with feeling rather than urgency, and Wade would have been content just to do this. Just this, and nothing else, forever, as long as he got to live in this feeling, this knowledge that Peter needed him just as much as he needed Peter.

But just because _he_ could do this for hours didn’t mean Peter was quite as patient. The boy shifted beneath him, arching his back to press Wade in deeper, and whimpered into their kiss. “Need you. Gah, hah, I need you _so much_.”

“I’m yours, babe.” He promised breathlessly against Peter’s mouth. “I’m all yours.” 

Wade was more than happy to comply, rocking forward to create more pressure, more friction. It didn’t take long to work back up to panting, wanton desperation. Peter sank his teeth into Wade’s scarred bottom lip and Wade grunted, giving in to his urge to pull almost all the way out and thrust back in, hard and fast.

“Fuck!” Peter gave a strangled cry. “Fuck please, Wade. Like that.”

“Yeah?” Wade growled, shifting to hold Peter’s hips with both hands. “You want it hard?” He did it again and the resulting moan, long and wavering, set his fucking _teeth_ alight. 

He picked up the pace, shoving firmly into his spot over and over, and Peter pushed back into each thrust like he couldn’t get enough. Wade’s breath huffed out hard each time be buried himself inside, his abs tightening to keep the building pressure in his gut under control, and he could feel the white-hot tingles rising up beneath his skin. He caught Peter’s mouth in a quick, sloppy kiss before pulling back.

He sat back on his heels, running a soothing hand over Peter’s throat when he whined in protest, and yanked the boy’s hips up into his lap, sinking in deep. Peter gasped, his hands tangling blindly in the rumpled sheets as he scrambled to plant his heels on the bed and get enough leverage to push into it. Wade groaned, heat settling low behind his navel as the angle made Peter’s ass tighten around his shaft, holding him inside. 

He thrust forward a few times, digging his nails into Peter’s skin, but he couldn’t pull out enough to get the proper friction. Peter whimpered and squirmed and did his best to make Wade come right then and there, but it wasn’t quite enough. He wanted to get so deep inside that Peter would be feeling him there for days. For _ever_. He wanted the ghost of his dick to live inside Peter’s fucking blood.

Wade grabbed him by the arms and hauled him upright so Peter sat straddling his lap, and when he sank down onto his cock they both whimpered. Wade held them still for a moment, squeezing Peter’s biceps hard enough to bruise, and tried to breathe through the swelling wave of pleasure that threatened to tip him over the edge. Slowly, he loosened his grip and guided Peter up a little. He rose along Wade’s shaft, fingers digging into Wade’s shoulders and muscles contracting deliciously, and sank back down with an unrestrained moan. 

“ _Fuck_.” Wade agreed. It was tighter this way, and deeper too, each slide more intense than before. When he bent to rest his forehead on Peter’s shoulder and look down the plains of his narrow chest, he almost expected to see himself poking out beneath the skin, under the shadow of his ribcage, above the perfect little circle of his bellybutton. When he slotted his hands around Peter’s ribs and thrust up, jolting his small body, he could almost believe that he did see a shadow of distension there.

He shut his eyes and groaned, a heady rush of arousal nearly shattering him into a thousand pieces. Peter didn’t sound like he was far off either, pornographic sounds falling from his parted lips each time he pushed himself up and dropped back down again. Wade met him each time, rocking up as far as he could, pushing against the spot that made Peter’s face go slack with pleasure.

“Oh fuck Wade, oh god I- I’m… Wade, I… Wade. Wade Wade Wade Wade _Wade_.”

His movements turned sloppy, uncoordinated and rough, the filthy slick sound of Wade sinking into him over and over filling the sweltering air between them. Wade nipped at Peter’s jaw, breath heavy and damp on his skin, and thrust up harder than before. 

“Yeah, Pete, I got you.” His voice was gravel sticky with blood, wrecked. He fit one hand between them and wrapped his fingers around Peter’s leaking cock. “Go on and come for me, Baby Boy.”

Peter’s fingers trembled where their gripped the leather of his suit. He held his breath, short little gasps punched out of him every couple of seconds, and he went still, letting Wade drive up into him with vicious insistence. Finally he cried out, burying his face in Wade’s neck, and his dick twitched in Wade’s grip.

Wade groaned when he felt Peter’s muscles contracting around him, squeezing him so tight that it was hard to keep his rhythm. He clung to awareness with the sharp tips of his teeth and stroked Peter through it, wrapping his free arm tight around his back and clutching him close.

He felt hot release spill over his fist, and he was gone. He clung to Peter as he drowned, washed over with wave after wave of _yes_ that filled him up from his toes to his eyes, a steady build that just kept climbing impossibly higher until he wasn’t even sure he was alive, but dying had never felt so _good_ before.

He didn’t know how long it took for the world to come back to him this time. It came slow. At first it was just Peter’s breath, slow and heavy against the skin under his jaw. Then the kiss of his mouth, just wet lips, parted and still, resting there. He could feel Peter shivering after a few moments, the occasional tremor running through his body as he experienced aftershocks. He had gone slack, letting Wade take his weight, and the tangible feeling of him in Wade’s arms was incredibly grounding. 

He willed his eyes open with a fair bit of effort and peered down at the pale skin of Peter’s back. It was dotted with dark red and purpling marks at the back of his ribs and hips where Wade had held him too hard. Maybe he should have felt guilty, but there was only contented satisfaction as he brushed his fingers over the bruises. Peter made a small, plaintive sound at the touch, and shifted ever so slightly, his hair brushing soft and damp against Wade’s neck.

Wade let his breath out on a hum, skin still buzzing with the afterglow of his orgasm as he loosened his grip on Peter just enough to slip one hand under his chin and guide his face up for a kiss. It was soft and lazy, a barely coordinated meeting of mouths with just a hint of tongue, but it was the sweetest taste he’d had all night. 

When they broke apart, Peter was staring up at him with completely dazed eyes, glossed over and far away. But he didn’t look at Wade like he couldn’t see him. He looked at him like Wade was the _only_ thing he could see.

It made Wade’s breath catch in his lungs, a tight breathlessness seizing in his chest. He slid his palm over the delicate line of Peter’s jaw and gently swiped the pad of his thumb over that swollen bottom lip. Peter shivered slightly, his eyes falling closed as he went limp in Wade’s arms. 

He allowed himself a moment, closing his eyes and just appreciating the fuck out of this indescribable feeling. He breathed it in, making an effort to etch every detail of it into the part of his mind that stored the most important, permanent parts of himself. 

When his suit was sticky and unbearable against his skin and he couldn’t justify clinging to the moment any longer, he carefully shifted forward, trying to get Peter situated so he could be laid back on the sheets. The movement reminded them both, quite sharply, that Wade’s half-hard cock was still buried in Peter’s ass. The boy whimpered sharply, tensing up against Wade, and he winced and smoothed a hand down Peter’s back. 

“Just a second, honey.” It wasn’t the best position for a smooth dismount, and he had to nudge at Peter’s thighs to get him to raise up enough for Wade to slip out. He took it slow, but the friction was still a bit much and he knew Peter must be incredibly sensitive after that. It was his first time, after all.

{Oh.}

[…]

{My. Gah…Uh…}

Wade ignored the incoherent return of the boxes with nothing more than a slight twitch at the edge of his mouth, focusing on getting himself out without catching on Peter’s tender rim. He still let out a grunt of discomfort as Wade’s head pulled free, and a slow trickle of warm ejaculate dribbled out afterwards, falling onto the bare skin at the top of Wade’s thigh. He swallowed against the tug of arousal in his gut and set it aside for all the time he was going to spend thinking about this later.

“Lay down.” He whispered into the quiet of the room, leaning forward to lay Peter out on the bed, supporting his shoulders and head until they hit the pillow. He went willingly, still pliant and heavy in Wade’s arms, and let his legs fall free from where they’d been clutched around Wade’s thighs. Wade’s gaze raked appreciatively over his body, taking in every inch of flushed, sweat-dampened skin. He was sticky with other substances too, particularly between his thighs and across his stomach.

“Stay here.” He ordered gently, leaning over to press a kiss into Peter’s forehead before he leveraged himself of the bed, doing his best not to disturb the beautiful boy where he lay. He didn’t even open his eyes, just made a vaguely agreeable sound under his breath as Wade tugged his pants up over his ass and padded into the bathroom. 

He hesitated in front of the sink, mind whirling.

{Did we… Just…}

[We did.]

{Oh.}

Wade blinked at the cracked porcelain for a moment before he got busy peeling off his dirty, sweaty suit and kicking it into the corner. He probably smelled like sex and sweat and damp leather, but he wasn’t going to leave Peter alone long enough to shower. He quickly washed his hands and splashed cold water on his face, then used a washcloth to clean the come from his dick and help it to go soft under the cold administration. He dug sweatpants and another hoodie from the pile at the bottom of the linen closet, foregoing underwear since he knew he didn’t have any clean pairs anyway. 

He briefly considered pulling on a spare mask as well, but he knew Peter wouldn’t like that. For some unfathomable reason, he _wanted_ to see Wade’s ugly mug. And right now, most of Wade didn’t seem to mind that. 

He got a fresh hand towel, his last clean one, and fastidiously dampened it with warm water from the sink. He turned to move back into the bedroom, but hesitated in the doorway, his heart stuttering in his chest. This was Peter. _Peter_. And the last hour had been so incredibly fucking fantastically perfect that a Wade half expected to walk in to an empty bed, cold with disuse.

He wasn’t sure if he could survive that.

But when he forced his muscles into compliance and crossed the threshold into the softly lit room, the bed was blissfully occupied. Peter lay exactly where Wade had left him, hair splayed artfully across the pillow, eyes shut, mouth parted around heavy, even breaths. He looked even smaller lying in the middle of Wade’s queen mattress, hipbones two sharp triangles jutting out above his splayed legs. He’d thrown one arm across his chest, and it rose and fell with the rhythm of his breathing.

{Oh. My god. He’s so… Beautiful.} Yellow was hushed, reverent, and Wade felt that sense of awe settling into every fiber of his body, because Peter wasn’t just beautiful. He was _perfect_. 

He padded forward with hushed steps and climbed onto his knees at the edge of the bed, careful not to disturb the sleeping angel. He could only stare for a few seconds though, because he didn’t want the cloth to get cold, so he leaned over to rouse Peter with a light brush of knuckles over his upturned cheek.

Peter stirred with a soft, sleepy whine, lashes fluttering wearily as he rolled his head towards Wade, searching without fully opening his eyes. He bent to brush his lips over Peter’s, his own mouth turning up into an uncontrollable smile.

“Who gave you the right to be so fucking cute?” He whispered, nudging their noses together. 

Peter’s only response was an incoherent hum, his nose wrinkling in that way that only made him _more_ fucking adorable.

{I might die. I might literally die.}

Wade pressed his grinning face into the warm crease of Peter’s neck. “I gotta clean you up, sweet boy. I’m gonna use a wet washcloth, okay?”

Another nonverbal hum, which Wade took as an affirmation because it sounded pretty agreeable despite his being fairly certain that Peter was half asleep right now. He scooted himself closer and began to swipe the wet cloth over the fronts of Peter’s thigh. The boy seemed to wake himself up a bit when Wade dipped between his legs, carefully cleaning the soft, sticky skin of his inner thighs. 

He shifted a bit, squirming against the sheets when Wade raised the washcloth to gently wipe his spent cock free of any dried substances. He got everything off his stomach too, folding over the cloth to get to a clean side before gently swiping under Peter’s balls and slipping lower, into the crease of his ass. 

Peter’s legs tensed a bit, trembling with the effort to remain open, and when Wade’s gaze flickered up, he found Peter staring blearily at the ceiling, his cheeks warm with a delicate pink. His nose wrinkled again, a look of discomfort crossing his face as Wade brushed against his rim.

“Does it hurt?” He asked quietly, looking down to make sure he could see what he was doing as he cleaned the area as gently as he could.

“Um…” Peter’s voice was rough as hell, vocal chords strained and overused. “Just, uh… Just a little.”

Wade made a sympathetic sound, pulling the cloth away to see a bit of pink staining the off-white. He dabbed at Peter’s hole a little more firmly to gauge how badly he was bleeding, and Peter flinched away with a weak hiss.

“Stings.”

“Sorry, Baby Boy.” He checked the cloth again, but there was still just a small, pale spot, so it didn’t appear to be too bad. “I’ll go out and buy you some Desitin in the morning, okay? I know people think it’s for babies but that just means it’s extra soft and kind for your delicate skin.”

Peter hummed again, then groaned with effort as he rolled onto one side and curled into a loose-limbed ball, clearly ready to pass out.

Wade smiled to himself and pushed off the bed to put the soiled cloth in the pile of dirty shit across the room. Peter looked over his shoulder at the movement, struggling to blink his eyes open and looking mildly alarmed. 

“Where…?”

Wade just about died. That fucking look should be _illegal_.

“Don’t worry, Pete, I’m comin’ right back.” And he did, climbing back across the bed and tugging at the covers until he could pull them up over Peter’s bare body and tuck him in. 

“Can’t let you get cold.” He murmured, reaching to click the lamp off before carefully slipping in behind his precious boy and wrapping one arm around his narrow waist.

“Mm.” Peter made an effort, but his breaths were already lengthening out as he shuffled backwards, pressing into the warmth of Wade’s body and tucking his face into his shoulder. As soon as he fell still, Wade could tell he was slipping under the heavy curtain of sleep.

{Poor thing must be utterly exhausted.}

“You tell me that you haven’t slept in days.” He murmured under his breath.

[You tell me sleeping only makes you tired anyway.]

{Tears are in your eyes tonight.}

[Tears are in your eyes every night.]

Wade buried his nose in soft, tangled hair and sighed, Peter’s earlier confession echoing unpleasantly in the back of his mind. But now wasn’t the time to obsess over that, so he pushed the thoughts away and clutched Peter a little closer against his chest. Feeling his stomach rise and fall under his arm made Wade feel a sort of calm that he couldn’t really remember experiencing before. Surely he had, but it had been so long since he’d felt this _content_ , this secure, that the sensation was unfamiliar.

“Just your touch could cure my lonesome blood.”

He stayed up for a long time, sinking into the delicate warmth of Peter’s living body, feeling him breathe, solid and real in his arms. He looked so much less troubled when he slept, the lines smoothed away from his face, his youth more apparent than ever. 

Wade could lay here forever just watching him sleep. But his mind was blissfully quiet, and eventually, when the edges of his shaded windows were gaining a faint orange glow, Peter’s steady inhales and exhales lulled him into unconsciousness. 

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Peter was gone when Wade woke up.

The empty side of his bed was cool and bare, illuminated with the slatted afternoon sunlight filtering in through broken blinds. For one wild, terrifying moment, Wade was sure he’d imagined it all.

But then he sat up, and his eyes landed on the mess of dirty clothes across the room. There, on top of a torn-up suit, was the drying, off-white hand towel still spotted with Peter’s blood.

Peter’s blood.

The events of the previous night flew through his mind and he felt his face growing warm with the rush of arousal that accompanied the memories. 

{Holy fuck. It was real.}

[Yeah, and now he’s gone.] White’s voice was muted, but his bitterness was still audible.

Wade fought a frown, climbing to his feet and padding through the bedroom and out into the small living area, confirming that Peter’s soggy clothes were gone as well. So was the sweatshirt he had changed him into. 

{He probably had to go see his aunt! It’s not like he could hang around here all day.}

“Yeah, that’s true.” 

It’s not like he could have expected much else, after all. It seemed unlikely that Peter would be able to stick around for pancakes and lazy, post-coital make out sessions the morning after. 

“Besides, doesn’t he have… School?”

[It’s the summer, you dunce.]

{Maybe he has summer school.}

Something uncomfortable and seductive squirmed in Wade’s stomach, but he employed his Level 500 avoidance skills and went to take a much-needed shower, ignoring the feeling.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Wade was out on the rooftops by ten in the evening. It was a bit early, but he was eager. Eager and excited and more than a little nervous to see Spidey. To see Peter. To hold him and touch him and kiss him again, because it had only been a few hours but Wade was fucking _desperate_ for his taste, his smell, the warmth of his breath.

[We shouldn’t have let this happen.]

{Oh? I didn’t hear you complaining last night.}

The bickering had started as soon as he left the safe house, but Wade hummed under his breath and practiced his parkour through the rumbling city, not letting it get to him. 

[Gosh, I wonder why. It’s not like it’s been a couple _years_ since Wade put it in someone. And it was _him_. I was compromised. But that doesn’t change the fact that we’re going to regret the fuck out of going all the way with Ms. Jailbait 2018.]

{Fall off your fucking high horse and stop pretending. We all know you get off on the Boy Lolita anime just as much as the rest of us.}

[That’s a fucking logical fallacy, you idiot. Even our readers know the difference between enjoying something in fiction and condoning it in real life.]

It didn’t take as long to find Peter as he’d expected it might, and discovering him lingering on the side of a building in their usual ten-square-block territory of Midtown produced a pleased, warm feeling beneath Wade’s ribs.

“Spidey!” He called out from across the street, waving his arm enthusiastically to catch the hero’s attention. 

It was hard to tell if Spidey was looking at him, because that dark stealth suit really did blend in well with the shadows and his eye patches weren’t reflective anymore. Surely he could hear Wade with his super hearing, though, and a few moments later he was twisting to shoot a web and swinging across the street in a graceful arc. Wade felt a little short of breath as he landed a few feet beneath the rooftop and unhurriedly crawled up the rest of the way.

“Hey, Baby Boy.” He greeted as Peter climbed over the ledge, voice dropping into huskiness at his proximity. His movements looked a little stiff as he straightened up, and Wade felt his blood darken with satisfaction. He stepped in close, raising a hand to the cool, firm line of his waist. “You feelin’ sore today?”

Peter stepped deftly aside, slipping out from under Wade’s touch, and crossed his arms over his chest. “Not really.” He responded with an unbearable chilliness.

{Oh shit.}

Wade blinked, his perspective shifting with the suddenness of ice water dumped over his head.

[So that’s how it is. See? I knew it.]

He swallowed, resisting the urge to mirror Peter’s pose and cross his own arms in defensiveness. “Right. Well, uh, that’s good. You left without waking me, otherwise I would’ve helped you with, uh, you know, taking care of it.”

He could see the twitch of Peter’s jaw tightening beneath his mask, and he turned his head away, averting his gaze from Wade. 

“What exactly did you expect?” His words were harsh, forced out with cold bitterness that was no less sharp for the hoarseness in his voice. “You thought I was gonna stick around for – for what? Moldy takeout and a cold shower?”

Wade stared, stunned into silence for a few heartbeats. This vicious Peter was so different from the soft, needy boy of last night that it took him a moment to readjust to the Spider-Man he’d observed over the last couple of weeks. He set one hand on his belt to fidget with the clasp on his hip holster. “Well, no. I mean…”

“Oh, no, I see it now.” He let out a bark of a noise, too frigid and unhappy to be a laugh. “You thought this meant we were getting back together, didn’t you?”

{We’re not?}

“You thought just because I – I _slept_ with you, that I’d just run back into your arms and we’d be prefect happy beaus or something?”

Wade felt hollow, like his stomach had been scooped out of his body. “Are you in summer school?”

“What?” Peter’s scathing glare of confusion couldn’t have been clearer if his mask were transparent. “No. Look, what happened last night doesn’t fucking change anything. I needed something. I took it from you. That’s all.” 

He dropped his arms to his sides and stalked into Wade’s space, posture stiff with threatening intent. “If you don’t like it, you can just fucking _leave_.”

The words hung like frost in the air between them, cracked and poisonous.

Wade’s insides churned with hurt and anger and the grim realization that this was a challenge. A fucking test. Peter was going to push and push and scratch and bite and _hurt_ until Wade gave up on this. On him. 

They stared at each other for a long moment, frozen in a silent standoff, Peter’s fingers wrapped around the metaphorical knife driven into Wade’s stomach. Eventually Spidey turned away, a disgusted sound crawling out from behind his clenched teeth. He started to walk towards the roof’s edge, poised to leap off it and disappear into the night, but Wade’s hand shot out to stop him at the last second.

He wrapped his fingers around the thin bones of Peter’s wrist and yanked him back around, jerking his body close so Wade could lean down and speak right into his face, his voice a low growl. “I am _not_ leaving again.”

He tightened his grip and shook Peter, jostling him hard. “You fucking hear me? I am _never_ going to leave you. No matter what.”

Peter’s breath was heavy beneath the mask, huffing out in unsteady puffs, and Wade could feel him trembling. Without a word, he used his strength to break free of Wade’s iron grip and dart towards the open air, fleeing.

Wade watched him go, his own hands shaking at his sides and breath just as labored. 

[You’re not good at keeping promises.]

“This time is different.”

[How?]

“This time I’m not worried about doing what’s right.” 

He stared out at the spot where Peter had disappeared, the red and blue and yellow lights below casting a sordid glow that hung under the shadows at the tops of the buildings. He stared at that spot where light faded into darkness, and he hardened his heart.

“I don’t care if this is the worst decision I could make. I don’t care if it’s wrong. If I’m hurting him. Or myself. No matter what, I am _not_ leaving him alone. Ever again.”

[You want him to be ours?]

{Yes.}

[Fine. He’ll be _ours_.]

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Song Credits:

Chapter Title:  
Breathe Me (Four Tet Remix) – Sia  
Lyrics:  
Atrophy – The Antlers  
Fix You – Coldplay  
So Let Us Create – Jukebox the Ghost  
Tears Are In Your Eyes – Yo La Tengo  
Twins – Gem Club

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It finally happened. It only took one year, 260,000 words, and twenty-two chapters to get them to fuck.
> 
> I hope it was worth the wait ;)


	6. My Head Is Full of Flames

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back, sweet readers.
> 
> I think it's official by now. Updates for this story will most likely continue to be slow, as I must face the sad reality of my lacking industriousness. Still, they shall continue to come trickling in, and I hope you shall continue to enjoy them!
> 
> Take pleasure where you can find it, my lovelies.
> 
> You know where to look for the song credits.
> 
> Love and affection,  
> Sordid

**Peter**

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

_I want to hurt him._   
_I want to give him pain._   
_I’m a roman candle._   
_My head is full of flames_

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

It was hot. 

Hot in a stifling, heavy way, but Peter didn’t feel like he was suffocating. More like he was… Held down. Pinned in place by a weight that pushed the tension from his bones and made his blood move sluggish and sedate through his veins.

Light turned the insides of his eyelids a dull, pulsing orange, and waking came slow.

There was no jolt into consciousness, no shredded edges of a nightmare to slice him on the way out of a dream, and the complete lack of panic made him want to sink back into sleep like a smothering embrace he had missed for far too long. It was also that absence of panic that made him stir, pulling himself from the depths of contented unconsciousness to blink the sleep from his eyes, gradually placing himself back in his body.

A steady heartbeat, even and strong, pressed into his skin and echoed in his ears. It took Peter a few seconds to realize that it was Wade’s pulse that throbbed through his veins, imprinted onto Peter’s body where the larger man was slung across him, bearing him down with his considerable weight. Warm breath hit his collar, huffing slow and deep from between Wade’s parted lips. 

It should have felt claustrophobic, but it didn’t. Peter wanted to curl in closer, burrow under the heat and let it crush him until he was nothing but parts, all the strain leaking from his dissembled joints until there was no more left. He might have done just that, but a glancing memory of the previous night roused him with a little jolt of giddy pleasure. He shifted against the sheets, and a dull aching throb at the base of his spine made his cheeks flush hot.

His gaze flickered towards the shaded windows, and the angle of the sunlight streaming through the slats told him that it was nearly noon. Every muscle in his body begged him not to move, but he held his breath and carefully slipped out from under Wade’s clinging grip, leaving the sheets tangled around the mercenary’s waist.

He watched for any signs of waking, operating under the assumption that Deadpool was a light sleeper, but there was no movement other than the flicker of dreaming eyes beneath lowered eyelids. Peter climbed off the bed, attentively avoiding any jostling of the mattress, and stepped soundlessly across the floorboards. He moved through the apartment like a ghost, wincing as he pulled on his cold, damp clothes.

He may have tugged Wade’s sweatshirt on over his musty button down, twisting the excess sleeves between his fingers as he hesitated in the doorframe of the bedroom. His heart clenched in his chest as his eyes lingered on the subtle crease between Wade’s brows, face now pressed to Peter’s abandoned pillow.

He had to walk home. 

It was slow going on the crowded streets, and each step squelched under his heels, wet fabric of his socks chafing the skin at the back of his ankles.

All his skin tingled and throbbed like a fever as he climbed the stairs to his apartment and slipped silently through the front door. He could hear Aunt May in the kitchen, the creak of the linoleum chair and shuffle of her clothes, and he pressed close to the far wall of the short little hallway on his way to the bathroom, keeping out of sight. 

His lower back pulsed an echo of achy pain as he bent over to turn the shower on with the usual screeching squeal of protesting pipes, and he bit down on his bottom lip to stifle a wince at the sensation. The sting of broken skin on his swollen mouth only served as an even more potent reminder of every bruising touch, and he busied himself pulling off his shirt and kicking it into the corner, careful with his movements so as not to aggravate the strange dull throb between his legs. The hoodie he hung over the hook on the back of the door. He reeked of sweat and sex and damp, and he hoped with a terrible desperate longing that the water would get hot today. Steaming, scalding hot.

Muffled footsteps tracked down the hall, and urgent knocking on the bathroom door rang unpleasantly over the hiss of water hitting porcelain. “Peter?”

“It’s me.” He called back, raising a hand to rub at his throat when his voice came out scratchy and hoarse. (Who the fuck else would it be?)

“Where the _hell_ have you been?” She was angry, reverting to the fuming disciplinarian, but Peter could hear the strain of fear and relief and exhaustion beneath her words, and he swallowed against a trickle of guilt.

“Out.” He muttered, wincing at the burn in his throat before raising his voice to be heard better through the door. “Can we talk about it after I shower?”

There was a loaded pause, and Peter could picture the pained exasperation on her face, the concerned line between her eyes as she held them shut for a moment, steeling herself.

“I’ll make lunch.” She conceded, words muted, and Peter listened to her footsteps receding back towards the kitchen before he stripped off his shoes and socks and pants and moved to stand in front of the sink.

He stared at himself in the mirror, eyes immediately drawn to the livid black marks scattered over his neck and shoulders. They stood out against his skin, dark and shocking in their violence, and the big one on his left shoulder bore the shape of Wade’s teeth. He raised a hand to prod delicately at it, twisting his head in the mirror to get a better look. He stared, wide eyed, at the way the edges ran purple and blue, like streaks of thunder clouds swollen and heavy with rain. 

Burst veins beneath thin, breakable skin.

Peter wanted to feel dirty. He wanted to feel like it was wrong. Like what they’d had last night was poisonous. 

But it wasn’t. He searched for sickness inside himself, tried to drag the hatred and disgust up from the depths of his stomach, but he was too tired. Too well-rested for the first time in weeks and weeks and too fucking tired of the effort it took to maintain his righteous fury. He was drained of it, and all he felt was... cared for.

Wade took care of him.

He turned from his reflection with a quiet sigh and stepped into the shower, eyelids fluttering in pleasure at the sting of heat as the water hit his back, spitting and steaming.

He was sore. Even with his healing factor, he ached inside. His rim stung as the water trickled between his cheeks, and he could still feel the phantom stretch of Wade’s dick inside him. And he was _so fucking big_. Peter could remember exactly how it felt, the pleasure pain, intense and inescapable, like the massive object shoved up inside him had pushed his insides aside to make room.

He washed his hair, flushed and tingling with each stretch of his body making him aware of the ache in his muscles, then poured soap over the thin green washcloth that hung over the faucet. He cleaned himself out as best he could, gritting his teeth as he held himself open for the flush of water and swipe of soapy cotton. It was uncomfortable, a little painful, and when he prodded a little too enthusiastically, the cloth came away spotted with a faint trace of red. He might have been concerned if he hadn’t done an excessive amount of internet research into the topic of gay sex back when he’d first started craving it with Wade (back _before_ ). By all accounts, a little tearing was perfectly normal for a first time, even if the dick stretching you out _wasn’t_ freakishly massive.

Besides. Something dark and sticky and buried deep really liked it. Liked to see the blood and the bruises. Liked knowing who put them there.

Even after he was done, lathering soap over the rest of his body to wash away the salt and rain and tears, he could still feel Wade’s come deep inside him. Could feel him twitching, warm wetness pulsing into him. He could close his eyes and feel it, and it should have felt dirty and sordid and wrong, but he liked it. It was darkly satisfying, imagining he had a piece of Wade still with him. In him. Carrying it around as a claim.

He didn’t have anything to cover his neck, so he pulled his old threadbare robe off the back of the door and slipped it on over a fresh t-shirt and sweatpants. He hadn’t worn the thing in years, and the fuzz that lined the collar was matted and thin, but it was high enough to hide the bruises when he tied the robe shut around his waist. 

When he walked into the kitchen, Aunt May was laying out plates of grilled cheeses and carrot sticks on the table. He took a seat, avoiding her eyes as he sank into the folds of the robe like it could hide or protect him. At least the dull throb of sitting distracting him from the weight of guilty anxiety settling in his gut.

She passed him a glass of water, which he accepted with a mumbled thanks and promptly drank half of in several smooth, long gulps, then sat down across from him. A moment of tense silence lingered in the air before she spoke.

“Where were you last night?” 

He took a breath. Swallowed. Fidgeted with a carrot stick before tucking his hands into his lap.

“I, uh… I was…” He blew out a breath, twisting the tie of the robe between his finders. He realized with a flash of hot sinking disappointment that he’d left all the paperwork from that lawyer at Harry’s place, and that was going to make this a lot harder to explain. “Um, I got a call yesterday, and… H-Harry, he…”

To his intense frustration and tired mortification, his breath caught in his chest and he had to pull in a couple of short, trembling gasps to ease the tightness in his lungs. His eyes stung too, and he swiped one sleeve impatiently across them, mildly annoyed that there was anything left to leak out.

Aunt May made a soft, pained sound and reached across the table for him, but he gave one sharp shake of the head and she froze, then retreated.

“He left me stuff. In his… His will.” He forced the words out, low and halting. “It, uh… Caught me by surprise, I guess. And, um. They gave me a key. To his apartment. So I went and I...” For a moment, the words swam across the page in front of him, the curve of the letters familiar in Harry’s scrawling handwriting, and he took a deep breath to get his voice back. “I was crying for a long time, and I guess I fell asleep. And then this morning my phone was dead so I couldn’t call you. I’m sorry.”

He still couldn’t look at her. Couldn’t bear to see the pity on her face. The pain and helplessness. He couldn’t take that on with everything else. He didn’t want to resent her too.

“Peter, I’m sorry.” Her voice shook a little, and he gave a half-hearted shrug, bringing a carrot to his mouth and snapping off the end with his teeth. It tasted like paper on his tongue. “That’s really hard, honey.”

He considered taking a bite of the grilled cheese, but he could see the greasy sheen of fried butter on the surface of the golden bread, and it made him a little sick to his stomach.

“Were you, um…” Her tone had shifted, and Peter’s eyes flickered up automatically, taking in the uncertainty on her face. “Were the two of you…” She hesitated again, clearly struggling with the words, and a brief grimace flickered over his expression. He looked at the table again.

“Were we together?” He supplied flatly.

She exhaled a bit shakily, and did reach out to lay her hand over his wrist this time, unaware that the touch made him tense. “Peter, you _know_ I love you, no matter what.”

The platitude sparked his annoyance, and he suppressed another unpleasant face. Was this him… Coming out? How disappointing. “Yeah, I know. And yeah… We, uh, were.”

It was easier to tell her that. Easier to let her make assumptions like everyone else, excuse his behavior as grief and pain over losing a… Boyfriend. Lover. Whatever. People were more ready to accept misery over the loss of a romantic partner than a best friend. And wasn’t that just fucked up, somehow? Well, if she was distracted by Peter’s newfound gayness then at least she wouldn’t be hounding him every second of every day.

He was still caught by surprise when she got up from her chair with a sudden scrape of metal on linoleum, rounded the side of the table, and bent over to wrap her arms around his shoulders. She clutched him close, grip unexpectedly strong, and patted the back of his head. “I’m proud of you, Peter.” He blinked, stomach clenching with emotion as she turned her face to kiss his temple. “You’re such a strong boy. Growing up so fast.”

She pulled away slowly, giving him a watery smile and graciously ignoring the wetness he was blinking from his eyelashes as she patted his cheek. “Too fast.”

She returned to her seat and Peter composed himself with a couple of forced swallows. He reached for the grilled cheese just for something to do with his hands and took a small bite, chewing it for much longer than was actually necessary before he could get it down. She started attempting to eat as well, and a sudden pulse of affection and appreciation prompted him to grasp for something that might reassure her, ease her burden somehow.

“I, uh… I’m gonna do something.” He offered disjointedly. “To keep busy.”

“Oh?” She was trying for casual, but there was hope in her voice. “What did you have in mind?”

The first thing that popped into his head was definitely _not_ a good idea, but it came out of his mouth anyway. “I was thinking I would go ahead and take that Stark internship.”

As soon as he said it he wanted to stick his tongue out like the words had left a bad taste behind his teeth, but he refrained.

Aunt May blinked at him. “That… Sounds like a good idea.” She spread her hands over the placemat beneath her plate, smoothing over the corners. “But when Mr. Stark was here, you seemed… Well, neither of you sounded very happy with each other.”

It was probably the most tactful way of pointing out that they’d both screamed and cursed at each other. Well, Peter had done most of the screaming and cursing. And throwing things. He heaved a sigh. “Yeah, I know, but. That was just because he was talking shit about Oscorp ‘cause he wanted me to work for him, and I just… Lost it. It was too soon after, you know.”

He could see her nodding understandingly out of the corner of his eye, so he spun the lie a little further. “But, um, he emailed me a while ago. And I apologized for how I acted, and he acknowledged that he was being a dick, too, so…” Yeah right. “It’s alright, I guess.”

She made a thoughtful sound through a bite of her grilled cheese. “So, you think he’d still accept you for the internship?”

If she thought it odd that Tony Stark, billionaire founder of the Avengers, was taking a personal interest in nobody Peter Parker from Queens, she didn’t show it. Maybe she really thought Peter was just that special. The idea was like a rock in his stomach. 

“Yeah. I do.”

She nodded again. “Then I think it’s a great idea.” And that was that.

They ate the rest of their lunch in comfortable silence, Peter managing another three or four bites before picking his food apart and leaving the rest in pieces on his plate. After May took the dishes to the sink and washed her hands, she announced that she’d be taking an evening shift and Peter shouldn’t wait up. He was momentarily confused at the change in her schedule, and then brimming with guilt when he realized that she must be making up for taking off work when he didn’t show up at home last night or this morning. He nodded miserably, and she drew his attention with a hand on his shoulder and a focused stare.

“Get some sleep.” She commanded, smoothing her hand down his arm. “And Peter?” Her gaze grew hard. “Don’t _ever_ do that to me again.”

He flushed with shame, ducking his head in agreement. “I won’t. I’m sorry.”

She kissed his head again, and left to change into her nursing uniform.

Peter sat in the kitchen for a long time, tracing idle shapes over the cracks in the surface of the table.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

When Peter went out on patrol that night, the stinging had abated but he could still feel that ache deep inside, undeniably present when he flexed his abs and swung his legs, webbing across the city to his usual Midtown hunting grounds.

As he neared the area where he and Wade usually found each other, a warm pleasurable anticipation stirred in his stomach. He imagined Wade greeting him, overenthusiastic and affectionate, gathering Peter into his arms and pushing their masks aside for a sweet, slick kiss. He imagined the seductive, intoxicating words that Wade might say in that dark, rumbling voice that made Peter weak at the knees and left his skin buzzing like he’d pressed his tongue to a live battery. His heart thumped and his body throbbed with the eagerness, the _need_ to see Wade as soon as possible. And he realized, with a short burst of clarity, that he was seeking Wade out to feel home. To feel safe.

He stumbled to a halt on the nearest rooftop, panic seizing his lungs in its cold iron grip. He bent over his knees, shaking, gasping, trying desperately to gulp down the air but he couldn’t _breathe_. Everything was a blur and he couldn’t fucking breathe.

“Your heart rate is abnormally high, Peter. Are you feeling alright?”

He shook his head mutely, still struggling against the oppressive weight smothering the air from his chest, but Karen’s tranquil voice was enough to shift his attention, pull him out of his own head. It took a few seconds to feel like he was no longer in danger of passing out, but soon he could straighten back up and press trembling fists to his eyes, rubbing harshly at them through the mask. 

“’M fine.” He mumbled, even though he wasn’t. 

He couldn’t _rely_ on Wade. Couldn’t let himself become dependent. Couldn’t _need_ him. Not again.

And what filled him with intense terror and helpless clawing desperation, was the creeping suspicion that he already did. It was too late. He was too far gone. He’d let Wade back in and now he’d got his claws in Peter, his teeth. Gotten into his bloodstream.

He forced himself off the rooftop after a few minutes, but stubbornly refused to go barreling headfirst towards Wade as he had before.

It wasn’t long before the mercenary found him anyway, calling out to him from a hundred yards away like he knew Peter could hear him from half-way across the city. Could hear his voice anywhere. Everywhere.

And when Peter swung across to join him on the next rooftop, dismay made him sharp and fear made him rude. 

The words were torn from him like fishhooks, leaving him bloody and tattered as they flew from his mouth, and he couldn’t stop. He couldn’t stop the vicious, hateful lies that twisted across his tongue. And he could see each one land on Wade like a blow, see his hurt like a physical thing. But still he couldn’t stop himself, couldn’t take it back, because Wade was going to give up on him. Wade was going to let him go. Was going to leave him. Alone.

But when he turned to flee, Wade caught him.

Wade caught him, and didn’t let him go.

And the words he spoke, the _promise_ he made was the most frightening thing of all.

_Never going to leave you._

Because those words made Peter feel… Hope. Delicate, treacherous, _dangerous_ hope.

_No matter what._

When he left, tore himself from Wade’s crushing grip and ran, he lurched from fight to flight so fast it left him dizzy from it. He didn’t stop running, the frantic adrenalin driving him to push his body as hard and fast as it could go, until he was back in Queens.

He dropped into the abandoned side street where he kept his change of clothes and fumed. He paced. He swallowed down a scream that felt swollen and hot in the back of his throat. He was angry, and he was scared, and he was resentful of the writhing mess of emotional turmoil in the back of his skull that whispered how much easier it would be to give in to it and stop pretending that he hadn’t already handed over whatever mangled pieces were left of his heart, giftwrapped with Wade’s name on the tag.

Aware that he probably shouldn’t complete his patrol given the genuine possibility of accidentally killing someone in his current state, Peter changed into the ripped-up jeans and black t-shirt he’d stuffed into the backpack earlier that night. He turned towards home, but the thought of returning to his empty apartment and going out of his mind while sleep evaded him again made him more than a little sick to his stomach. Instead, he walked.

He walked for a long time, with no particular destination in mind. Just the scuff of his shoes on concrete and the echo of his thoughts curling into futile Gordian knots. He walked for what was surely hours, secure in the knowledge that Aunt May wouldn’t be leaving work until the morning shift took over at six, but fingering his phone in his pocket even so.

Queens wasn’t exactly… _peaceful_ at night, but it was something more sedate. A low rumble of seething activity beneath a dark veil of calm as opposed to the constant frenetic hum of Manhattan. Usually he liked it, but tonight it was unsettling. Empty. Restless. His feet carried him towards the more populated areas, and he slowly weaved his way back towards the river, chasing the lights and the cars and the people.

He found himself on a busy street lined with shops and restaurants and every window still lit up with neon and noise, people swinging the doors open in steady streams of coming and going. His shoelace came unraveled and trailed pitifully alongside his steps until he stopped, tipping his head back in a sigh of tired exasperation before bending to one knee to tie it up again.

“Hey, man.”

Peter straightened back up, eyes flickering over the guy who stood beside him, immediately wary of being spoken to in the first place. He was in his mid-thirties or so, average height and stocky build, wearing expensive looking jeans and a tight white tank top that showed off his biceps and the gold chain around his neck. Not the prettiest face, but not an ugly one either.

“You wanna party tonight?” He gestured behind himself with one hand, and Peter glanced up to take in the face of the building. It was a club of some sort, the windows tinted dark and the name shining seductively in a deep red glow. It looked plain on the outside, but he could see flashing lights and hear the clear, dull thump of bass echoing down the dim hallway just behind the heavy painted door that stood propped open. There was a sad little red velvet rope stretched down the sidewalk, but no one stood in line. Just the man, standing proprietarily in front of the open doorway, one thumb hooked over his belt loop.

A bouncer.

Peter looked at him, then back at the club, finding the situation a bit too surreal to understand what was being asked of him.

“Huh?”

The man smiled like he thought Peter was being deliberately cute or something. “You wanna come in? I can wave the cover charge since we’re kind of empty tonight.” The friendliness of his smile melted into a smirk, light enough not to seem predatory, just on the kind side of flirtatious. “Pretty boys tend to improve our numbers.”

Peter stifled a reflexive snort, narrowly avoiding the urge to turn and look behind him for someone else that this man might be trying to invite into his club. Pretty boys? What? Peter was sure he currently looked like a homeless cat, bedraggled and messy and ready to hiss at anyone who came too close. He was ready to laugh it off and tell this guy to go fuck himself, but his eyes lingered on the open doorway, caught on the curling edges of posters he could see plastered to the painted walls inside.

Why the fuck not?

“Yeah, sure.”

The bouncer flashed a brief grin and stepped aside with a grand gesture of his arm, waving Peter into the club.

“Have fun!”

He slipped past him and into the club before he could change his mind and realize what a stupid, juvenile idea this was probably going to turn out to be. The hallway felt like a tunnel, dark and close, and winding his way around the corners felt like passing into a different world. The air was cooler, carrying the hazy scent of chemical fog and sweat and alcohol, and the floor vibrated with the music, decibels climbing with every step he took. He passed an empty coat check and then he was stepping into the main room, faltering to a stop on the edge of the massive dance floor. 

It wasn’t empty. It wasn’t even close to a slow night, as far as Peter could tell. In fact, he hadn’t seen this many people gathered in one space since school ended. There was a massive bar to his right, lined with people and drinks, an elevated stage where a DJ stood behind his equipment on the other side of the room, and what looked like a lounge area beside a line for what must be the restrooms. The floor was well-populated, a small sea of people jumping and stepping and swaying, holding drinks or each other.

Peter couldn’t see many faces, the details lost in shadow between the sporadic, rhythmic lightning flash of the strobes. And the music was loud. Very loud. It was the first time in a while that his senses felt nearly overwhelmed, filled up to the brim and straining with the sheer volume of stimulation in a place like this. He let his eyes slip closed for a moment. Let it wash over him until the beat was pulsing across his skin, sinking into his muscles, tracing the edges of his teeth with electric euphoria. 

Without ever really making the conscious decision to do so, Peter spent the next two hours on the dance floor. He let himself move to the current of the music and the crowd, let everything fade into a haze until all that mattered was the build of the beat, the ebb and flow, the drop. 

And for those two hours, Peter’s head was blissfully empty.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Peter slept for a little while in the morning, watery sunlight leaking through his blinds to keep the night terrors to a dull roar. Aunt May was still asleep when he woke up, so he showered off the scent of the club and took to the streets once again, his suit stuffed into the backpack slung over one shoulder.

It briefly occurred to him to take the train up to Stark Tower and see if he could speak to Tony about the fake internship, but he quickly filed that idea under the heading of _I’d rather drink poison acid and rot from the inside out_. The days were slow for crime, but he was itching after taking the night off. Dancing until his hair stuck to the back of his neck and he couldn’t think over the ringing in his ears had been cathartic, but it didn’t get the rapists or the murderers or the drug dealers off the street. 

So Peter took the train into the city instead and found a dark, quiet alley to change in, optimistic that he might snag a few pick pockets or dealers. Maybe a mugger if he got lucky. He slid smoothly behind the corner of a dumpster, hidden from view of the sidewalk streaming with people just a few yards away, and unzipped his bag to pull the suit out. He was reaching to unbutton his jeans when the unmistakable sound of boots hitting the pavement nearby made him jump.

He whirled around, fingers instinctively reaching for the web shooters he wasn’t wearing and heart clenching in panic at the lack of warning from his Spidey sense. The sight of Deadpool standing there with one thumb hooked casually over his utility belt brought a pulse of relief, followed quickly by a powerful wave of anger.

“Strip tease in a back alley? This reminds me of the opening scene to one of my favorite pornos.”

Peter hissed through his teeth, eyes flickering up to the nearby fire escape that Wade must have jumped from, then back to pin him down with a livid glare. “What the fuck?”

Wade sighed, nodding in concession. “Yeah, I know. Except in the video you already have the mask on, so it’s more of a fetish thing. But I like this way better, probably.”

“Are you _following_ me?” He spat.

“Yes.”

Wade went still, no hesitation or shame in his answer, mask blank, and the sudden shift in demeanor sent a chill down Peter’s spine.

He stalked forward, steps slow and sure, and Peter stood frozen in place, his body stuck wavering, confused, between nervous anticipation and pissed indignation. He flushed hot when Wade reached his personal space and stepped right through it, forcing him to flinch back until his shoulders hit the wall.

Wade continued until there was no more room between them, one leg slotted between Peter’s as he braced on arm on the bricks and bent over him, not quite pressed against Peter’s body, but close enough to feel the heat of him, to smell the leather. Before Peter could react, he lifted a gloved hand and snagged the collar of his t-shirt, pulling it down and to the side until he could peer at the bruises and bite marks painted across the ivory skin, yellowing and mostly healed.

“Hm.” He hummed, a deep, satisfied sound that hooked behind Peter’s stomach and yanked.

Peter sucked in a shaky breath, a small tremor running across his skin, before coming back to himself. He gripped hard onto his thread of outrage and yanked his arm up to knock Wade’s hand viciously aside.

“Don’t fucking touch me!”

They stared at each other for a moment, Peter’s gut twisting, his heart pounding behind his ribs. And then Wade’s hand was back in a flash, fingers curling around the column of his throat and pinning him firmly against the wall.

His grip was unyielding, just tight enough to feel the ache of restriction, and Peter went limp.

He sagged, boneless, and the increased pressure against his trachea made his lashes flutter, his breath catching in a gasp behind his teeth. He was so turned on it was insane. He was dizzy with it, the blood rushing south so quickly he felt flushed and chilled and hot in flashes, like he had a fever. 

An answering intake of breath from Wade, sharp and short through his mask, indicated that he saw _exactly_ the effect he was having on Peter. He leaned in, hovered close, until their mouths nearly touched. Light headed and without control, Peter tipped his chin up, flexed his neck under Wade’s sturdy grip, until his parted lips brushed leather.

Wade sucked in another breath, longer this time, the air passing thick through his nose like he was fortifying himself. He seemed to hold it for a moment, stretching out the suspended space between heartbeats. Slowly, every other part of his body nearly rigid in stillness, he peeled his fingers from Peter’s neck one by one.

Then he dropped his hand, and took a solid step backwards, leaving Peter panting and trembling against the wall.

“Alright then.” He nodded to himself, loose and casual, as if the last thirty seconds hadn’t happened at all. “We’re gonna go grab some food.”

Peter stared, speechless. He was sure his shock and incredulity must be written across his face, but Wade didn’t seem inclined to acknowledge his sudden hundred and eighty-degree shift. 

“You.” He jabbed a finger in Peter’s direction, tone leaving no room for disobedience. “Are gonna crawl yourself up to that rooftop right there and wait for us.”

Peter opened his mouth to argue. To say _no_ , absolutely fucking not. But no sound came out, and Wade just nodded again, once, and then he was gone. Slipping out into the street traffic without a backward glance.

It took Peter a few seconds to peel his hands away from the wall beside his hips, where he’d pressed his palms flat against the bricks and clung. He took deep breaths, fighting to ease the molten ball of _want_ that churned in his stomach, demanding attention. 

“Fuck him.” He muttered, reaching to snag his bag from where he’d dropped it on the filthy ground. The asshole thought he could just follow Peter from his apartment, corner him in an alley and just expect his demands to be followed? “No fucking way.”

He’d leave while Wade was occupied, just find a different place to change and with any luck, his stalker wouldn’t find him again until the next time Peter had to return home. He was going to walk out of this alley and turn the opposite direction of the way Wade had left, and just… Be done with this shit.

But his legs carried him to the fire escape instead, and he mounted the rungs with sweaty palms and unsteady muscles. He climbed to the roof, edges of his teeth tearing skin off his bottom lip as he went, and paced around until he found an adequate place to sit down. He sank to his knees on a relatively clean patch of cement, out of sight of the pedestrians and cars passing by far below, and huffed out an angry sigh.

When Wade got back, he was going to inform him very clearly just how much he did _not_ intend to follow directions like a fucking dog. He’d give the mercenary a piece of his mind, and then he would leave, and Wade could eat his fucking _food_ all on his own.

He sat and stewed for a while. Too long. He shifted restlessly and fumed and thought about all the nasty words he could sling at Wade. He convinced himself to leave a dozen times but never managed to climb to his feet.

Eventually his ears caught on the ring of boots on metal, the distinct sound of Wade climbing up behind him, muttering under his breath as he came. Peter braced himself, crossing his arms over his chest and clutching at his sleeves, teeth clenched into a snarl.

Wade approached quickly, balancing two pizza boxes on one hand, and sank down gracefully beside Peter before he could say anything.

“Here.” He shoved one of the pizzas into Peter’s lap and flipped the lid open. “Pepperoni and green pepper ‘cause even though I know you’re not extra picky I figured maybe your tummy might not want a lotta complexity. But you also need your veggies so I picked the plainest one. I mean, onions are plain too but some people don’t _like_ onions and I’ve never met a person who actually dislikes green – ”

“Wade.” Peter interrupted, trying to push the pizza off his lap.

Wade shot out a hand to stop him, firmly keeping the food where it was. 

“Eat.” He ordered, ignoring Peter’s attempts to speak. “I’ll force feed you if I fuckin’ have to. Look like you haven’t eaten in weeks. Fuck.”

He peeled a slice from his own pie and rolled his mask up enough to take a massive bite. Peter grimaced, but found himself looking down at his pepperoni and green pepper pizza anyway. It didn’t smell terrible… And it didn’t look too greasy. Maybe he could just take a bite. And then yell at Wade. And then leave.

He did so, chewing slowly. Just one bite, that’s all he had to manage. But before he knew it, he was picking up his second slice with both hands and shoving at least a third of it into his mouth at once. He wasn’t _hungry_ , but it was the first time in a while that he had an appetite. He quickly put away half the pizza before his stomach started to ache, unused to the excess after weeks of barely feeding himself. 

They’d eaten in silence, and when Peter finally glanced sideways he found Wade already had his mask back in place, nothing left in his pizza box but crusts. He had the sudden, ridiculous impulse to ask what kind it had been, since he hadn’t paid attention. Did Wade still like pineapple and olives?

He nearly shook himself in irritation, because it didn’t fucking _matter_ what the mercenary liked on his pizza, or whether he’d changed the top ten songs on his iPod, or if he was doing this out of guilt or an actual desire to, like, care for Peter or something. If such a desire existed.

It didn’t matter.

He shoved the box from his lap, remaining pieces scraping against the cardboard as they slid. Then he crossed his arms over his chest again and rolled up onto his knees to face Wade, readying himself for the altercation he knew was coming.

He could tell Wade was watching him out of the corner of his eye, could see the steady consideration in the lines of his shoulders, the way he tilted his head without quite granting Peter his full physical attention. It made him tremble, electricity stuttering down his spine with the awareness of such close regard. He was… anticipatory.

They were going to fight. Or they were going to fuck. Either way, there would be bruises.

Wade heaved a full body sigh, brushing his gloves off on the legs of his pants before climbing to his feet with exaggerated effort, grunting gratuitously on his way up. Peter scrambled to stand as well, unwilling to remain on his knees at Wade’s feet (although the brief moment that he’d allowed Wade to stand over him had twisted into his stomach like claws). 

Still, the mercenary said nothing. He was clearly provoking Peter to draw first blood, so Peter obliged, opening his mouth on the shape of derision, sucking in the air that would fuel the storm brewing between them.

“Well.” Wade cut him off, careless enough that Peter might have thought it was unintentional if he didn’t know _perfectly_ well that Wade was aware of each and every breath that stretched beneath Peter’s ribs. “See you tonight for patrol!”

He waved one hand as he strode towards the roof’s edge, not sparing Peter a single fucking glance as he stepped right off it and landed somewhere below with a vaguely distant clang that meant fire escape or dumpster, rather than bone-shattering cement.

And for the second time that afternoon, Peter found himself staring after Wade in indignant shock, with rage and disbelief making his skin too tight and his muscles twitch with restless violence.

 

*************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Instead of going home for dinner, Peter called Aunt May and told her that he and Ned had made up and he wanted to stay over and watch movies.

Instead of heading out on patrol when darkness fell across the city, Peter went to the club.

It looked bigger, this time, when viewed from across the street. There were people hanging around outside, smoking and talking by the sad red velvet rope. The name stood out, a graphic crimson glow against the black cement: Crave. 

Peter felt young and silly in his tightest jeans and borrowed Mötley Crüe t-shirt. Aunt May had cut off the bottom a couple of decades ago, leaving the fabric frayed and curling at the end, and the small size stretched tight and faded across Peter’s chest even though he’d never remembered it looking so small on her. It wasn’t so short that it showed more than a thin sliver of his skin above the waistband of his pants unless he raised his arms over his head, but he still found himself regretting the choice.

Fuck it anyway. It didn’t matter what he did, or how much he made an utter fool of himself, so long as he did _not_ see Wade for patrol tonight. He would refuse to follow Wade’s orders if it was the only damn thing he could manage to accomplish.

Steeling himself to be turned away, perhaps with a laugh at his expense, he stepped off the curb and crossed to the other side of the street. He recognized the same bouncer as the night before, but lingered a few feet away, dragging his feet to the smell of cigarette smoke and cologne. It was clearly busier tonight, so it seemed less likely that he would be let in (especially considering that he couldn’t flash his ID at the door like the pair who just entered had). He was already resigning himself to finding some other stupid, reckless way to spend his night when the bouncer caught his eye and jerked his head, beckoning Peter forward.

He stepped up, bottom lip catching on his teeth as he bit down nervously. The man’s eyes flickered appraisingly over his face before his mouth spread into a grin, toeing the line between friendly and flirtatious again.

“Back so soon?” He asked. “Guess you must’ve had a good night, then.”

Peter shrugged one shoulder. “Sure. I like the music.”

The bouncer barked out a laugh, clearly amused, but waved Peter through good-naturedly. “Go on and enjoy the music, kid.”

Pleased, Peter darted forward before he could change his mind and ducked through the doorway once more. The bass pounded beneath his feet and the artificial fog tickled the inside of his nose, the lights dim and flashing until he rounded the last corner into the main room.

It was much more packed than it had been last night, and Peter allowed himself a moment to marvel at the sheer number of bodies pressed so close to each other. The dance floor was a writhing mass of skin and sweat and movement, almost hypnotic to look at, the bar was surrounded, and the couches were crammed with people talking, laughing, drinking, kissing, and climbing over each other’s laps.

Peter breathed it in like a drug.

He made his way towards the bar, a bit too intimidated to join the dancers just yet. He was pleased to see that he didn’t entirely stand out in his punk-teenage-runaway wardrobe, noting several other guys in tight jeans and small, faded t-shirts. There were other risky outfit choices as well, and he could see no shortage of leather and spandex, a conglomerate of every sort of person united in their desire to do something outrageous and curate a look to match. 

He found an empty space to slip into, intending to snag the bartender for a coke or a glass of water. It was a long wait, watching the two harried employees darting back and forth behind the counter, making drinks and handling money with impressive dexterity. He didn’t mind the time, though, alternating between keeping an eye on the service and leaning one elbow on the bar to watch the rest of the people in the club.

It wasn’t too long before he caught someone’s attention, but it wasn’t the bartender. Peter felt the eyes on him, the presence at his side, before he felt the light touch on his arm. He turned to a man who didn’t look all that much older than himself, light hair swept behind his ears in a neat sort of haphazardness that, when combines with his jean jacket and tight stonewashed pants, made him look like a soft rock star. He leaned in close to speak over the music.

“Hey!” He shouted, loud enough that his voice wouldn’t be lost under the thump of the speakers even if Peter didn’t have enhanced hearing. “Great track, huh?”

Peter stared for a moment, unsure what the point of this attempted conversation was. The guy seemed to take his silence as an indication that he had not been heard, and simply tucked his mouth closer to Peter’s ear for his next words, nose brushing against the curl of his hair.

“Are you waiting for someone?” He pulled back to meet Peter’s gaze, hazel eyes alight with some hopeful interest, and it hit Peter all at once what this must be.

This was _flirting_. Someone was flirting with him.

He gave the guy another once-over, considering. He wasn’t unattractive by any means, but there was a distinct lack of anything more than objective appreciation on Peter’s part. Regardless, he gave a mute shrug and a half-hearted shake of his head in response.

The man shook his hair out of his face and smiled as he leaned in again. “Can I get you a drink?”

Peter found himself nodding. Hell, if someone wanted to buy his drink then he wasn’t going to complain. It beat spending the seven bucks he had folded up in his wallet. He opened his mouth to request the coke he’d been craving, but hesitated, suddenly thinking better of it. He felt like doing something reckless. Something… Rebellious. 

Something Wade would hate.

He leaned back against the bar and reached up to curl one hand around the nape of the guy’s neck, thumb dipping under the collar of his shirt as he pulled his head down to speak against his ear.

“Tequila sunrise.”

It was the only drink Peter could remember Aunt May talking about when she used to go out with her friends more often, and it had always sounded hopelessly romantic and exciting to him.

Soft rock star pulled away looking a little flushed under the orange of the bar lights, and he quickly raised his hand to flag down a bartender. He got their attention almost instantly, and a silver credit card was exchanged for two drinks, one plain and amber in a short tumbler and the other tall and orange and wildly flamboyant for a club that reeked of salt and shadow and sex and smoke. 

He handed it Peter, fingers brushing, and bent close to speak. “I’m Jimmy, by the way.”

“Peter.” He responded, catching the straw between his teeth and taking a sip.

It was tart and sweet, and he could taste the strange bitter edge of alcohol underneath without the abrasive sting he had come to expect. It was… Surprisingly good.

It was thankfully too loud to make much more conversation than they already had, so Jimmy seemed content to lean close together on the bar and bob his head to the music. When they were both reaching the ends of their drinks, he managed to ask if Peter wanted to dance. Peter did, and they wove their way through the crowd to a spot towards the center of the floor. Bodies pressed in, heat and movement on all sides, and Peter closed his eyes to lose himself in it.

Words are very unnecessary. They can only do harm.  
Vows are spoken to be broken.  
Feelings are intense. Words are trivial.  
Pleasures remain.  
So does the pain.  
Words are meaningless. And forgettable.  
All I ever wanted.  
All I ever needed.  
Is here, in my arms.

The night progressed in a haze of dancing and drinks, hands on his wrists and waist, lips pressed against his hair to shout invitations into his ear. Are you here with someone? Can I get you a drink? Want to dance? Jimmy was replaced by Joe, and Joe was followed by two or three others whose names Peter didn’t bother to hear or remember. None of them were overly presumptuous, kept at bay by Peter’s mild indifference, and all of them eventually lost interest in his tireless affinity for the floor and the pounding beat.

It was an easy cycle, and after several trips to the bar (where he never had to dig his wallet from his pocket), Peter was experiencing what must be a pleasant buzz. Apparently his geared-up metabolism didn’t entirely prevent him from being affected by alcohol, and he observed its effects with some interest.

He felt warm. And light. And heavy, too, all at once. 

He felt powerful and keen, something similar to the sensation of slipping into a fight. The sharp exhilaration of a well-placed kick. The knowledge that each fluid movement would accomplish its goal with perfect precision.

He felt dangerous.

Wade was stalking him. Even now, he would be out in the city trying to track Peter down, frustrated by the spider’s evasion, bitter that he wasn’t waiting like a good pet at their unspoken meeting place.

He was out searching, and Peter was here. Dancing with other men. _Drinking_. Being utterly, utterly bad.

And being bad felt so very good.

Perhaps tonight he would swap places with Wade. Tonight he would hunt, instead. 

He liked that idea. It bore his teeth in a feral grin as he slipped out of the back door of the club, cooling his face with the night air. 

He would hunt. He would track. He would stalk.

And he would pounce. 

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Song Credits:

Title:  
Roman Candle – Elliot Smith  
Lyrics:  
Soft Rock Star [Jimmy vs. Joe Mix] – Metric  
Enjoy the Silence – Trevor Something

 

*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************


End file.
